ISRO has major missions ahead, says newly appointed chairman

Thiruvananthapuram: Eminent rocket scientist and the newly appointed chairman of the Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) V Narayanan on Wednesday has expressed high hopes of taking ISRO to greater heights, especially when many major missions like the Gaganyaan are making progress.

"I thank Prime Minister Narendra Modi for giving me a great opportunity to hold a post that was earlier held by very eminent scientists. I hope I will be able to take ISRO to greater heights with the support of the entire ISRO team," Narayanan, who is now Liquid Propulsion Systems Centre director, told the media.

Narayanan, who is succeeding S Somanath, is considered as an expert in rocket propulsion and cryogenics.

During his four decade long term with ISRO, he played key roles in all major missions of ISRO including Chandrayaan-3. The L110 liquid stage and C25 cryogenic stage for the LVM3 propulsion systems developed by a team led by Narayanan for Chandrayaan missions.

He chaired the National Level Expert Committee for evaluating the reasons for Chandrayaan-2's hard landing and recommended corrective measures for the Chandrayaan-3 mission.

LPSC in Thiruvananthapuram delivered 190 liquid propulsion systems and control power plants for 45 launch vehicles and 40 satellites under his leadership as director.

A native of Kanya Kumari in Tamil Nadu, Narayanan joined the ISRO in 1984 after completing a diploma in mechanical engineering with first rank.

Prior to that he had worked with various TI Diamond Chain, Madras Rubber Factory and BHEL. Later he secured AMIE in mechanical engineering with first rank in cryogenic engineering and Ph.D in aerospace engineering.

While replying to a question, Narayanan said the information about his new appointment was first passed on to him by the Prime Minister's Office (PMO).

"The PM is deciding everything. The PMO has contacted. The current chairman S Somanath sir also called and said about the new appointment," he said.

While giving details about the upcoming projects, Narayanan said the ISRO launched the Space Docking Experiment (SpaDeX) mission on December 30 and the docking experiment of the SpaDeX satellites would be held on January 9.

Stating that Gaganyaan is another major programme before the ISRO, he said the works related to the launching of the uncrewed module or uncrewed rocket as part it are successfully progressing.

He said works are progressing at Sriharikota to send the navigation satellite, NVS 02, using a GSLV later this month.

The works to send a commercial satellite of the United States using ISRO's Mark III vehicle and the rocket assembly as part of Gaganyaan (G 1) are also progressing there (Sriharikota), he further said.

While talking about the Bengaluru-headquartered agency's future projects, Narayanan said as everybody knows, India has become the first country to land in the south pole of the moon through the Chandrayaan 3 mission.

"In Chandrayaan 4, the objective is to land there and come back collecting samples. Works in this regard have already started," he explained. He also mentioned about the setting up of India's own space station.

"The Prime Minister has given approval for building a space station for us...The space station will have five modules and an approval has been granted to launch the first among them during (the year) 2028," the new Chairman added.

According to an official order, V Narayanan was on Tuesday appointed Secretary, Department of Space, succeeding S Somanath, who will complete his tenure next week.

With PTI inputs