As the crucial Budget session of Parliament begins, the UPA has a major chance to correct course. If it wastes it, it risks disaster, says Praful Bidwai.
The president and CEO of Devas, Ramachandran Viswan-athan said, "It is puzzling to hear about such a decision, especially as we have not been intimated. We have not received any communication from any quarter, government, Space Commission or Isro."
The polar satellite launch vehicle-C42 launch vehicle carrying the two satellites blasted off from the first launchpad at the Satish Dhawan Space Centre at 10.08 pm.
"The CAG's office and Department of Space have already issued statements stating the factual position on the matter. It is further clarified that no decision has been taken by the government to allocate space segment using S-Band spectrum to ANTRIX or Devas. Hence, the question of revenue loss does not arise and any such reports are without basis in fact," the PMO statement said.
While New Jersey, US-based OrbitBeyond leads a consortium of subcontractors who have designed and developed hardware for deep space missions, Bengaluru-based Team Indus is leading OrbitBeyond's lander engineering, reports T E Narasimhan.
Prime Minister Dr Manmohan Singh spent the second half of Tuesday with Union Ministers and senior officials to prepare himself for Wednesday's proposed meeting with editors.
The inquiry into Devas Multimedia's deal with Antrix, the commercial wing of Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO), has found that when the Indian arm of the company was founded in 2004, it had just two shareholders and a paid-up capital of Rs 100,000.
The UPA government looks set to give the contract a decent burial and, in turn, redeem ISRO and itself.
India's space agency has in its pipeline eight foreign satellites for launch and is scouting to acquire such spacecraft from abroad to expand capacity in the field of communication transponder back home.
The Indian State does not believe in the rule of law. It does not even recognise the need to follow treaties that it itself signed. And so it is refusing to shell out to Cairn; and, as a consequence, has brought on the Paris humiliation, notes Mihir S Sharma.
The Indian Space Research Organisation will launch four foreign satellites this year as it seeks to make further inroads into the international satellite-building and launch services market in 2009.
ISRO, through Antrix Corporation, has inked commercial agreements with EADS Astrium of Europe to jointly make and supply two commercial communication satellites.
The space agency launched 104 satellites, breaking the previous record of 37 by Russia.
'The only loser is the tax payer who doesn't have a clue as to how his money is being used.'
Though this is part of the divestment drive, government's stake in these companies remains 100 per cent even after the buybacks
The Indian Space Research Organisation has resolved to alight its lander on the lunar surface with Chandrayaan-3 in addition to a maiden solar expedition in 2020.
The Indian Space Research Organisation has entered into an agreement with a private company to set up automatic weather stations, the Lok Sabha was informed on Wednesday
The year ended with the launch of the PSLV's 50th mission.
Our governments are easily prone to arbitrary decisions but if you are dealing with international firms, such arbitrariness can turn back and bite you, says T N Ninan.
The ISRO is strengthening 'eye in the sky', which helped the Indian army carry out surgical strikes last year, with the launch.
The space agency has set 2020 as the deadline for the first privately built rocket to be launched into space.
The Indian space agency has already begun work on the third generation of the earth observation satellite -- the first of which will be ready by 2018 and boost the capability to generate digital maps.
ISRO said, initially the launch was slated for 9.49 am, but now there is a 3-minute delay owing to the probability of space debris in the path of rocket.
There is a huge spurt in demand to launch smaller satellites, those as light as 1 kg, with a lifespan of two to three years. But there aren't enough rockets to carry these, reports T E Narasimhan
However, some of the provisions in the draft Bill needs scrutiny, as these could scare away international investors
'By pushing PSLV production to industry, the extra ISRO personnel available will be utilised to do projects like the human space mission.'
The primary goal of HysIS, whose mission life is five years, is to study the earth's surface in visible near infrared and shortwave infrared regions of the electromagnetic spectrum.
Connecting with people is the first step to creating greater awareness for the brand and that in turn, believes ISRO chief K Sivan, will translate into the institution becoming a place that people want to work in.
The successful orbiting of the satellites by the Polar Satellite Launch Vehicle PSLV C-40 comes four months after the Indian space Research Organisation's mission to launch backup navigation spacecraft IRNSS-1H onboard PSLV-39 ended in a rare failure.
Global analysts say a successful launch of operational GSLV MkII rocket will reduce dependency for ISRO on foreign launchers.
Just over 22 minutes into the flight, the rocket put Astrosat into orbit at an altitude of 650 km above the earth
Finance Minister Piyush Goyal: 'I hope the Congress governments and other states like West Bengal, Odisha, Tamil Nadu, Andhra, Telangana will support our effort to bring petrol and diesel into the GST regime.'
Other than the Cartosat-2 series satellite, the PSLV is carrying 29 nano satellites from 14 countries - Austria, Belgium, Chile, Czech Republic, Finland, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, Latvia, Lithuania, Slovakia, the United Kingdom and the United States of America besides a nano satellite from India.
After 5 yrs, firm's offer to set up private satellites for digital push has seen some interest from Isro
PSLV C-29 blasted off from the Satish Dhawan Space Centre, about 110 km from Chennai, at 6 pm and released the six satellites one by one into a 550 km circular orbit.
'His secretary of defence nominee, General James Mattis, says he expects Pakistan to take action against terrorists operating from its soil.' 'Any pressure the US can bring on the Pakistani regime terror-wise would pay dividends for India.'
'We referred the case to the attorney general.' 'I told Mukul Rohatgi, "mujhe aap ka honest opinion chahiye".' 'He too said those were different offers.' Trai could not have stopped Reliance even if the Jio offers had been the same, Trai chief Ram Sewak Sharma tells Subhomoy Bhattacharjee.
In his first interview, after the launch of MOM in Mars orbit, ISRO chief K Radhakrishnan spoke to T E Narasimhan about the mission and the way forward.
'India has got a unique opportunity to get more and more business from outside as India is cost-effective and reliable.'
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