CHENNAI: The private space sector has been reaching for the stars and making giant leaps recently. India received its first private rocket launchpad and mission control centre at Satish Dhawan Space Center, Sriharikota on Monday, thanks to Chennai-based startup Agnikul Cosmos.
This comes within weeks after India’s first private rocket Vikram-S was successfully launched by Hyderabad-based Skyroot Aerospace, using a sounding rocket launcher of the Indian Space Research Organisation from Sriharikota’s shores. Inaugurating the startup’s launchpad, ISRO Chairman S Somanath said, “The first private launchpad in the country gives India one more platform to travel to space.”
The maiden launch is scheduled for sometime in December. SR Chakravarthy, one of the advisors for Agnikul and head of the National Centre for Combustion Research and Development (NCCRD), IIT-Madras, said, “We are pushing for Mission Readiness Review in the next 10-15 days, after which the launch date will be given by ISRO.”
Enough precautions were taken to ensure safety, Agnikul co-founder Moin SPM told TNIE. “There is a distance of 4 km between the Agnikul’s launchpad and the mission control centre. Both are connected with two independent lines just to have 100% redundancy and operationality.”
A six-metre tall single-stage rocket will be flying Agnikul’s patented semi-cryogenic engine, putting India on the world map. The full-scale orbital launch vehicle Agnibaan will be a customisable, two-stage rocket, capable of taking up to 100 kg payload to orbits around 700-km high (low Earth orbits) and enables plug-and-play configuration.
Srinath Ravichandran, CEO and co-founder of the startup, said building a launchpad was a necessity because the rocket needed a vertical lift-off. Meanwhile, ISRO’s launchpads cannot be utilised due to their gigantic size. According to ISRO, Agnikul’s launch facility can support liquid stage-controlled launches, monitor key flight safety parameters by ISRO’s range operations teams during launches, and share data with the Mission Control Centre.
The space agency said the establishment of this private launchpad marks a significant step in opening the space sector to private players. It affirms the commitment of ISRO and the Department of Space. It may be noted Agnikul Cosmos, incubated by IIT Madras, became the first Indian firm to sign an agreement with ISRO, in December 2020. Under the IN-SPACe initiative, the firm gained access to ISRO’s expertise to build Agnibaan vehicles and the launchpads.