"ISRO faces launch failures, attrition, and private sector competition"
IN-SPACe
Indian National Space Promotion and Authorisation Centre; nodal body regulating and authorising private space activities in India.
NSIL
NewSpace India Limited; commercial arm of the Department of Space for technology transfer and launch services.
The Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO), established in 1969 under the Department of Space, has been the cornerstone of India's space programme for over six decades. Built under conditions of technology denial — particularly after the MTCR (Missile Technology Control Regime) restrictions limited access to cryogenic engine technology in the early 1990s — ISRO developed an indigenous capability ethos that produced landmark missions including Chandrayaan-1 (lunar orbiter), Mangalyaan (Mars Orbiter Mission, the first Asian nation to reach Martian orbit), and Chandrayaan-3 (the first soft landing near the lunar south pole). The organisation's workhorse launch vehicle, the Polar Satellite Launch Vehicle (PSLV), became one of the world's most reliable rockets with a near-unbroken record of success spanning decades.
India's space policy underwent a structural transformation with the Indian Space Policy 2023, which formally opened the sector to private players. The IN-SPACe (Indian National Space Promotion and Authorisation Centre) was created as a nodal body to regulate, promote, and authorise private space activities. Simultaneously, NewSpace India Limited (NSIL) was established as the commercial arm of the Department of Space. These institutional changes signalled a deliberate shift from a purely state-led model toward a mixed ecosystem where private startups could design, manufacture, and launch rockets and satellites — a model inspired by the success of commercial space in the United States under NASA's COTS (Commercial Orbital Transportation Services) framework.
The NCERT framework notes that ISRO's artificial satellites serve communication, navigation, weather monitoring, disaster management, and scientific research — functions that are now increasingly being replicated and commercialised by private actors globally. India's entry into private launch capability therefore represents not just a technological milestone but a structural shift in how national space capacity is organised and financed.
The current stress on ISRO's ecosystem stems from three interlinked phenomena: launch vehicle failures, project delays, and talent attrition to the private sector — each feeding the others in a cascading dynamic.
On the launch side, the PSLV-C61 (May 2025) and PSLV-C62 (January 2026) failures represent back-to-back setbacks for a rocket that had been ISRO's most dependable workhorse. The PSLV's reliability was central to ISRO's commercial launch business and its credibility as a launch service provider. Simultaneous delays in the Gaganyaan human spaceflight programme — specifically the first unmanned test flight G1 — compound the pressure, as Gaganyaan is India's most high-profile and resource-intensive current mission, intended to make India only the fourth country to independently send humans to space. The LVM3 (Launch Vehicle Mark-3), the heavy-lift rocket human-rated for Gaganyaan, is a separate vehicle from the PSLV but draws on overlapping pools of engineering talent.
The attrition dynamic is structurally significant. ISRO's current staffing stands at approximately 72% of sanctioned strength — the lowest in recent decades, with the previous low being 76% in 2013-14 and a peak of 95% in 2017-18. …
Consider the following statements:
The Mangalyaan launched by ISRO
1.is also called the Mars Orbiter Mission
2.made India the second country to have a spacecraft orbit Mars after USA
3.made India the only country to be successful in making its spacecraft orbit the Mars in its very first attempt
Which of the statements given above is/are correct?
Consider the following statements regarding India's space sector institutional framework:
1.IN-SPACe functions as the nodal body for authorising and promoting private space activities in India.
2.NewSpace India Limited (NSIL) is the commercial arm of the Department of Space.
3.The Indian Space Policy 2023 restricts private entities from independently launching orbital rockets.
Which of the statements given above is/are correct?
With reference to ISRO's staffing situation, which of the following statements is correct?
Assertion (A): The Indian Space Policy 2023 has contributed to talent attrition from ISRO to private space startups.
Reason (R): By enabling private entities to access space technology and build commercial ventures, the policy created an attractive alternative career ecosystem for ISRO-trained engineers.
Which of the following is correct?
Consider the following pairs of space missions and their descriptions:
1.Chandrayaan-3 — First Indian mission to achieve a soft landing near the lunar south pole
2.Gaganyaan — India's first crewed spaceflight mission using the LVM3 rocket
3.Mangalyaan — India's first mission to orbit Jupiter
Which of the pairs given above is/are correctly matched?
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