In a shot in the arm for Space Exploration Technologies, or SpaceX, founded by high-tech entrepreneur Elon Musk, the California-based company scripted history when its Falcon-9 rocket booster successfully landed at Cape Canaveral after despatching 11 communications satellites to orbit.
Thotakura was selected as one of the six crew members for the NS-25 mission, making him the first Indian space tourist and the second Indian to venture into space after the Indian Army's Wing Commander Rakesh Sharma in 1984.
The T-52 hour countdown for the launch of the PSLV-C7 began at 0548 hours on Monday, and it was progessing smoothly.
'With India's growing capabilities in the space sector, this creates promising opportunities for enhanced collaboration and market access.'
India's e-commerce market alone is projected to reach $200 billion by 2026, making it a prime industry for ambitious entrepreneurs, explains rediffGURU Harsh Bharwani.
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
China might one day be able to launch a surprise nuclear attack on the United States, the second highest-ranking American military officer has warned as he shed new details of Beijing's hypersonic weapons test in July, which sent a missile around the world at more than five times the speed of sound.
All progress in space should excite us and encourage us to be optimists about a better future for our planet and all of us, asserts Aakar Patel.
ISRO chairman A S Kiran Kumar talks of what's on and what lies ahead for the Indian space agency.
And what happens next?
Once ISRO masters the technology to send humans into space, the next step will be experimenting with technologies allowing humans to live in space.
What goes up must come down. In the science of rocketry, it always comes down with a thud. But that equation may change somewhat on Tuesday when the SpaceX rocket Falcon 9 blasts off from Cape Canaveral Air Force Station with goodies for the International Space Station.
Having reached the Red Planet, ISRO can now focus on getting humans in space and secure the resources to do it
'How will someone who has stood on Mars and looked at Earth, only a tiny blue dot in space, then see the idea of nations and religions and all of our divisions?' says Aakar Patel.
The rain water level may be receding in the city bringing relief to people but it is leaving a huge trail of mess, prompting the Chennai Municipal Corporation to launch a mass cleanliness drive for all its 200 wards on Sunday, for which some of the civic bodies from the neighbouring districts have also lend a helping hand to.
