Pakistan Space Exploration Missions

India has launched one of the major space missions “Chandrayaan” also known as the Indian Lunar Exploration Programme is an ongoing series of outer space missions by the Indian Space Research Organization (ISRO). The program incorporates a lunar orbiter, impactor, soft lander, and rover spacecraft. This program demonstrates that India is aggressively and ambitiously moving towards one of the space exploration-capable nations regardless of the economic condition of the Indian people and the absence of the basic necessities available to them.

Brief History of Major Indian Space Missions:

On November 5, 2013, the Indian Space Research Organization (ISRO) launched its first spacecraft bound for Mars. India built Mangalyaan (“Mars craft” in English) to study the Red Planet and test key technologies required for exploring the inner solar system. The Mangalyaan spacecraft successfully entered Mars orbit on September 23, 2014, making ISRO only the fourth space agency in the world to do so. Prior to India, only the United States, the Soviet Union and the European Space Agency (ESA) had successfully explored Mars. Mangalyaan operated for seven and a half years, observing Martian landscapes and studying their composition using its five science instruments.

ISRO originally intended to launch Mangalyaan on their Geosynchronous Satellite Launch Vehicle (GSLV) rocket instead of the only roughly half-as-powerful Polar Satellite Launch Vehicle (PSLV). As with most Mars missions, a GSLV rocket could’ve boosted Mangalyaan out of Earth orbit and onto an interplanetary trajectory to the Red Planet. But the rocket suffered two failures in 2010, just as Mangalyaan was being conceptualized. Fixing the identified issues in the rocket’s design and preparing for another launch could have taken at least three years, placing it close to the time-sensitive November 2013 launch window for Mars. The next launch opportunity was in 2016, so ISRO decided to launch Mangalyaan on a PSLV rocket in 2013 instead. However, the PSLV could only place Mangalyaan in a highly elliptical Earth orbit. It would be the spacecraft’s job to fire its engines at precise points in each orbit multiple times over the next few weeks to set itself on a trajectory to Mars, or it would miss the planet entirely. The trajectory design was highly unusual for a Mars mission but it worked. Once the spacecraft arrived at the Red Planet roughly 300 days later, it fired its engines again and successfully entered Mars orbit.

Mangalyaan entered Mars orbit with its closest point to the planet at about 420 kilometers (about 261 miles) and farthest at about 80,000 kilometers (about 49,710 miles), which is a much longer orbit than contemporary Mars missions. Over the years, ISRO reduced the orbit’s size but it never appreciably changed relative to other missions. For example, NASA’s Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter mapping mission has a nearly circular orbit of about 300 kilometers (about 186 miles) while ESA’s Mars Express has an orbit of 300 by 10,000 kilometers (about 186 by 6214 miles). Mangalyaan’s large and highly elliptical Mars orbit was tied to its choice of launching on a PSLV rocket. For the PSLV to place Mangalyaan in the desired Earth orbit, the spacecraft couldn’t be any heavier than it was — it couldn’t carry any more fuel. And because Mangalyaan had to get out of Earth orbit by itself, it needed to use its own fuel, which complicated its Mars orbit. This impacted the spacecraft’s scientific observations and mapping capabilities and is partly why Mangalyaan’s scientific output was low. However, Mangalyaan’s orbit did give it a great vantage point to capture full global views of Mars.

The fact that ISRO successfully placed a spacecraft in Mars orbit on its very first attempt garnered attention and praise from people worldwide. In India, the mission had even deeper effects, aided by ISRO’s inaugural efforts to be active on social media to make people at large aware of the mission. The mission saw several film and TV show adaptations in India, the most popular of which was the dramatized movie, Mission Mangal. The national government decided to feature an illustration of Mangalyaan on the reverse side of India’s highest denomination currency note of ₹2,000 (roughly $27). Writer Minnie Vaid wrote a book called “Those Magnificent Women and their Flying Machines,” which profiles the journeys of some of the key women who had leading roles in the mission.

Chandrayaan-1 launched on 22 October 2008 aboard a PSLV-XL rocket, performed several tasks such as mapping and atmospheric profiling of the Moon.

Chandrayaan-2 was launched on 22 July 2019[15] aboard an LVM3 rocket. The spacecraft was successfully put into lunar orbit on August 20, 2019[16] but the lander was lost while attempting to land on 6 September 2019.

Chandrayaan-3 was launched on 14 July 2023. The primary goals of the Chandrayaan-3 mission encompass three key aspects. Firstly, it aims to showcase a successful and controlled touchdown on the lunar surface. Secondly, it intends to demonstrate the mobility of a rover on the Moon’s terrain. Lastly, it seeks to carry out scientific experiments directly on the lunar surface.

Brief History of Pakistan Space Missions.

Pakistan space missions conducted by SUPARCO (The Space & Upper Atmosphere Research Commission) is the executive and national space agency of Pakistan. SUPARCO was Established in 1961 to assist the development of space science and research in Pakistan, the agency started to function only in 1964. It started to import and launch sounding rockets in the early 1960s and attained the capability to fabricate rocket engines. However, the agency kept a low profile for the initial 30–35 years of its existence with limited progress in the field of research and its progress in satellite technology also started relatively late.

The country’s first satellite, Badr-I, was built by the SUPARCO and launched from the Xichang Satellite Launch Center, China on July 16, 1990, which provided Pakistani scientists with valuable experience in telemetry and other satellite technologies. SUPARCO played a significant role in the development of Pakistan’s different rocket delivery systems during the early 80s and made significant progress in this regard.

In the meantime, the space program suffered many setbacks, difficulties, and problems that partly slowed the progress of the space program. SUPARCO imported and maintained a small amount of rocket fuel for scientific research and announced in 1999 that it will introduce its own satellite and launch vehicles in three years. However, no further details on this program were ever revealed. The agency now has been pursuing Space Programme 2040 since early last decade with the only aim to launch more and more satellites from other countries. SUPARCO has faced significant criticism within Pakistan for not being able to be up to its Indian and Chinese counterparts in terms of capabilities, both of which countries have emerged as major space powers in recent decades.

A proportionate Response from SUPARCO is the need of the time:

As Indians are showcasing their success in space exploration, regardless of the Indian people’s sufferings, just to boost the morale of Indian people and flexing muscles in the comity of nations. The media talks in India and across the globe are ongoing and in fact, covering well this Indian space advances.

Pakistan Must respond proportionally in order to curb Indian advancements and similarly boost the morale of the Pakistani people. Pakistan at least, should start a space exploration mission in the coming couple of years like Mission MARS and deeper space explorations. If landing on the moon is the way forward to showcase the capabilities of the comity of nations, so do it by all means. These said missions could be launched easily with help from China if leadership Will exists.

Furthermore, SUPARCO must be able to launch space missions within Pakistan in the future, and in order to archive that, aggressive attempts must be made technologically and administratively. Pakistan has a strong missile program and I am certain such technology and know-how exist in its advanced form so the effort must be focused now on major space exploration.