Washington: India, which is a global power and one of the few countries with independent access to space, needs to be part of the Artemis team, which brings together like-minded countries on civilian space exploration, a NASA said the top official. Based on the Outer Space Treaty of 1967 (OST), the Artemis Agreement is a non-binding set of principles designed to guide civilian space exploration and use in the 21st century. It is a US-led effort to return humans to the Moon by 2025, with the ultimate goal of expanding space exploration to Mars and beyond.
Bhavya Lal, assistant administrator for technology, policy and strategy within the Office of the NASA Administrator, told PTI on Friday that by May 2023, there are 25 signatories to the Artemis agreement and India is expected to become the 26th country. “I think signing the Artemis agreement should be a priority (for India). I mean, NASA feels very strongly that India, it’s a global power. It’s one of the few countries with independent access to space.” One is, there’s a thriving launch industry, to have been to the Moon, to Mars, it needs to be a part of the Artemis team,” he said.
“It’s about how we make sure the place remains sustainable for future generations. So, I think the benefit is that like-minded countries with similar values get a chance to explore together,” Lal said. The advantage is that India has declared that they are a global space power and values things like sustainable exploration, responsible use of space, cooperation, transparency, she said.
Lal, who was born in Mathura and raised in New Delhi, previously served as NASA’s Acting Chief Technologist and was the first woman to hold the position in NASA’s more than 60-year history. Prior to his current role and the first 100 days of the Biden administration, Lal was acting chief of staff at NASA and directed the agency’s transition under the administration of President Joe Biden.
Lal said that India and the US need to do more work on the Artemis program and do more work together on the Moon. “We actually recently established a Human Space Flight Working Group. The goal of that group is to develop a strategy for what we should do and how. I look forward to coming up with concrete opportunities to collaborate. Lots of success to the team,” he said.
“NISAR (NASA ISRO Synthetic Aperture Radar) is to be launched early next year. I hope it is on track, the highest-ranking Indian American at NASA said ahead of Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s visit to the US next week. Prime Minister Modi arrived here next week at the invitation of President Biden on an official state visit, during which space cooperation and related issues are expected to be one of the major areas of discussion.
India and the US recently established a Human Space Flight Working Group under their initiative of Dialogue on Critical and Emerging Technologies (ICET). Lal expressed hope that India would become part of the community that hunts down asteroids and comets that could impact Earth and cause a lot of distraction. “I’m excited about all the things that are coming down. Nisarga, Chandrayaan 3 this July, and Aditya mission again. That too this year. The upcoming Gaganyaan mission. LUPEX (Lunar Polar Exploration Mission) mission with Japan. India has these collaborations everywhere, not only with the United States, with Japan, with France,” he said.
“I’m most excited about India’s human space flight program because once India has a presence in low Earth orbit … we can take cargo to each other’s stations. We can send crew to each other.” It’s going to be very exciting to have multiple space stations in low Earth orbit, and it’s going to actually be a human in space,” Lal said. Indo-US space cooperation has had its ups and downs over the years. Initially, India focused more on cooperating with the Soviet Union.
“But again, I think the 2000 collaboration has been quite strong. On science missions, on human space flight missions, India started as a junior partner, a lot of capacity building,” said Lal, referring to India over the years. Has proved himself equally capable in every respect.
“The NISAR mission is a good example. India has a tool. The United States has a tool, and it’s really a collaboration of equals. So I look at development that way. And going forward, I think we We will be on a critical path for India’s missions. India will be on a critical path for US missions, and we will be true partners,” Lal said.
Noting that the Gaganyaan mission is only a space capsule for now, the NASA official said, at some point, India will have a space station. “It’s the next step. Even with Gaganyaan I think there are opportunities to dock with the space station, to carry cargo to the space station, to carry astronauts to the space station, and To prepare India for a future in low Earth orbit, NASA can do a lot. For example, train astronauts,” he said.
“So low orbit, tons of opportunities for collaboration on human space flight. On science, we’ve been collaborating for a long time. NISAR is a very exciting collaboration. I’m really excited about collaborating on the Moon. India has Maybe. Rovers and landers,” said Lal. Noting that NASA has a program called CLIPS for commercial lunar payload services, Lal said there could be a lot of opportunities for private companies in India to collaborate with these CLIPS providers and private companies in the US.
He said that this would help both the countries in private sector sports. “Planetary defense is a great area for cooperation. It’s something we’re all in this together. Sixty-five million years ago, there was an asteroid that basically destroyed all non-bird life on Earth. Don’t want that kind of stuff.” Happening again,” Lal said.
“The way to do that is to constantly look and see what’s coming next. A few months ago, NASA had a mission called DART, where we hit a small asteroid and it was a test and we moved it, but we We can only see what’s going on,” he said. Lal, who came to the US as an undergraduate student at MIT, said she wanted to study the new nuclear engineering that followed her Nobel Prize.
“The first thing I learned was that you don’t get a Nobel Prize in engineering. So it was a big disappointment from the beginning,” she said. She said, “I had huge cultural challenges when I arrived. Even though I spoke English, I had a lot of trouble with pronunciation… So, it took me a while to understand.”