Till now 25 countries are partners of Artemis Accords
An American space expert has expressed hope that space research will figure prominently in Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s talks with President Joe Biden at the White House when he is on an official visit to the US from June 21 to 25. Bhavya Lal, Associate Administrator for Technology, Policy and Strategy in the NASA Administrator’s Office, recently said that so far 25 countries have signed the Artemis Accords. He told that India will be the 26th country to sign this agreement.
Indian Bhavya explodes in NASA
Bhavya Lal is of Indian origin. He did his schooling from Delhi and holds Bachelor’s and Master’s degrees in Nuclear Engineering from MIT (Massachusetts Institute of Technology). Bhavya previously held the role of Acting Chief Technologist at NASA. He said that India and America should work together on many things in the Artemis program.
The strength of India is reflected in the statement of this American.
America’s space expert and former Associate Administrator for Space Policy and Partnerships at NASA Mike Gold said that ‘the relationship between America and India is very important on Earth, their relationship is even more important in space.’ He described India as a ‘sleeping lion’ for which there is no limit to doing anything. Means, India has that stamina due to which it can do whatever it wants. This statement of Gold has special importance because he is considered the policy-controller of Artemis Accords. He has appealed to India to join the Lunar Program of America. Gold has expressed hope that NASA will also help in ISRO’s Gaganyaan program and the destination of Indian astronauts will be the International Space Station (ISS).
India-America are increasing cooperation rapidly
In November 2022, the US started the Artemis program by sending an unmanned Orion vehicle to the Moon and bringing it back to Earth. It was part of his manned lunar mission. In the same year, India and America had agreed on advanced space collaboration in many areas. This happened under the ICET (Initiative on Critical and Emerging Technologies) agreement between the two countries. Under Advance Space Collaboration, India and the US will help each other in manned space missions and commercial space partnerships.
ISRO’s two missions will be launched in a few weeks
If there is a discussion between Modi and Biden on the subject of India’s involvement with NASA’s Artemis program as well as human space exploration, then it will be of great help to ISRO’s space exploration programs. India is about to launch Chandrayaan 3 mission and Aditya L1 Sun mission in the next few weeks. ISRO and NASA have so far worked together on the $1.5 billion NISAR satellite project. NISAR is the world’s costliest Earth observation satellite program that will monitor Earth’s changing ecosystems, dynamic surfaces and melting ice caps after its launch next year. NASA sent its instrument to the Moon from India’s Chandrayaan 1, which for the first time found evidence of water on the Moon.
by Surendra Singh published in toi.in Report with input from