No Indian-origin scientists joined ISRO from foreign agencies in last five years: Jitendra Singh to LS

No Indian-origin scientists have joined ISRO from foreign space agencies during the past five years and no scientists from ISRO have left India to join foreign space agencies during the same period, the government said on Wednesday.

In the Lok Sabha, Minister of State in the Department of Space and Department of Atomic Energy Jitendra Singh was asked about the number of scientists of Indian-origin who joined ISRO from foreign space agencies in the last five years and the number of scientists from ISRO who have left India to join foreign space agencies in the same period.

He replied "nil" to questions.

Responding to another question, he said the Department of Space/ISRO has taken measures to secure the Indian satellites from space debris.

The Directorate for Space Situational Awareness and Management is established at ISRO-HQ to manage ISRO's space assets.

The state-of-the-art Space Situational Awareness Control Centre is currently operational at Bengaluru for close approach analysis and assessment of threats to Indian satellites from space debris. It also designs and executes collision avoidance maneuvers whenever critical collision risk is identified, he said in a written response.

Singh said ISRO has implemented fortification measures like strong encryption of commands and authentication protocols in its older in-orbit remote sensing satellites to prevent access to the satellites. To deny information from the satellites (payload and satellite data), measures like directional transmission antenna, transmission of dummy data, switching off information over non-visibility areas to Indian stations etc have been implemented.

"More advanced fortification measures like strong encryption of both command and information are planned for the future satellites. Apart from encryption, techniques to protect satellites against jamming and spoofing are under development for implementation in its future communication and navigation satellites," he added.

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