People are asking justifications for India spending Rs. 450 crores for a
satellite are those with no vision. Let me tell you, India is not what is seen
in “Slumdog Millionaire”, which is an extreme portrayal of Indian society. It
left lasting wrong impression on people from west that india is land of extreme
poverty, filth and malnourishment. Its rightly siad, India is a rich country
but Indians are poor. There is a gross disparity between the rich and poor, but
that should not be the reason for not taking steps towards breakthrough scientific
achievements.
Some interesting facts about ISRO and its work:
- ISRO employs thousands of people in order to build and launch satellites PSLV-C26. If not whats the point is spending so much of money on space research and development. yes, PSLV-C26 is the result of those effort and Rs.450 Crores i.e., $75 million is a modest amount, as a satellite launch can cost anywhere between $50 million and $400 million according to the studies.
- Total Disbursements of ISRO for the year 2012-2013 – Rs.4,000 crores
- ISRO’s budget is only 0.34 per cent of the central government expenditure at present and 0.08 per cent of the Gross Domestic Product (GDP). There is so little to offer, but in turn ISRO has got more in return to offer back to the nation.
- ISRO’s Chandrayaan-1 cost 386 crore rupees (approx) which is almost 9 times less than what NASA spends on a similar exploration.
- ISRO is one of the six space agencies in the world with the capability to build and launch satellites from its own soil. In September of 2012, ISRO completed its 100th space mission with the launch of two foreign satellites.
- Current DTH services providers in India rely on satellites launched by ISRO, but the progress of DTH operators has been impeded due to the nonavailability of transponders. ISRO is working on launching more transponders.
How big is the amount spent on PSLV-C26?
Total cost to lauch the satellite Rs.450
Crore. Actual satellite costs Rs.153 crore.
The rest of the budget has been attributed to ground stations
and relay upgrades that will be used for other ISRO projects. It was not
a one day project, work started months before the actual launch.
The amount spent is nothing compared to hundreds of scandals in India. Let us compare the cost of Mangalayan to these notorious scams, which was approximately
0.22%
of Karnataka Wakf Board Land Scam
2012 (. Rs. 2, 00,000 Crore)
0.24% of Indian coal mining controversy 2012 ( Rs. 1, 85,591.34 Crore)
0.25%
of National 2G spectrum scam 2010 ( Rs. 1,76,000 Crore)
0.62%
of Maharashtra Irrigation Scam (Rs. 72,000 Crore).
0.64%
of Common wealth games scam (Rs.70,000 Crore)
1.28%
of Uttar Pradesh food grain scam
2003 ( Rs. 35,000 Crore)
1.55% Ultra Mega Power Projects Scam – where Central
government lost Rs. 29,000 Crore due to undue favours to
Anil Ambani-led Reliance Power.
4.5%
of Uttar Pradesh NRHM scam
2012 (Rs. 10,000 Crore)
These scams involved huge amount of money, defamed the country and still investigations are going on as most of the culprits are our politicians.
Yet, why launch the satellite when there are so many
already in the space from different countries and involves huge amount of
money?
“The primary objective of the Mars Orbiter Mission is to showcase India's rocket launch systems, spacecraft-building and operations capabilities. Specifically, the primary objective is to develop the technologies required for design, planning, management and operations of an interplanetary mission, comprising the following major tasks”
ISRO receives a lot of funding from developed
countries, they want to see the result of their investment. Launching a
satellite successfully is a way to show ISROs capability in designing such satellites
at such low cost and attract more funding. More countries, where certain GDP
will be utilized for space research will be willing to launch their satellites
from ISRO ground station.
People (not many common men, but celebrities, men and women with hell lot of money) are buying sites on Mars. There is a websites, Mars One, inviting applicants interested in one way travel to Mars. The mission was launched in April 2012 and people are registering. Over 8,000 Indians have registered paying the application fee and 2, 02,000 people across the world have applied for Mars one mission. The application fee varies from US $5 to US $75 (the amount depending on the relative wealth of the applicant's country). Imagine the amount of money collected just from the applications !! Mars One claims that in 2022, four carefully selected applicants will then be launched in a Mars-bound spaceflight to become the first residents on Mars, and that every step of the crew’s journey will be documented for a reality television program that will broadcast 24/7/365. Mars One aims to land four people on the Red Planet in April 2023 at a cost of about $6 billion.
All the pessimistic, cynical folks please watch the launch of PSLV-C26 and applaude.
