New Delhi, July 3
Prime Minister Atal Behari Vajpayee today dedicated to the nation the country’s largest indigenous satellite INSAT-3C and complimented Indian scientists for overcoming obstacles created by unfounded suspicions about the use of foreign technologies.

The Prime Minister also inaugurated a tele-medicine project for the Andaman and Nicobar Islands. Addressing scientists and technologists of the Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) after dedicating to the nation the third-generation satellite of the INSAT series, Mr Vajpayee said India had faced many obstacles to its space programme because of suspicions about how it would have used foreign technologies.

The Prime Minister also witnessed a live demonstration of how patients in a hospital in Port Blair were being treated and given medical advice through tele-medicine by specialists in a hospital in Chennai.

He said it demonstrated another social dimension to space applications and placed the top medical expertise in Chennai at the service of patients in far off Andaman and Nicobar Islands. The ISRO was planning to implement more such projects covering hilly, tribal and remote areas, he pointed out. Andaman and Nicobar Islands Lt- Governor N.N. Jha and doctors from Chennai also participated in the hour-long conference in Port Blair and Chennai, respectively.

He announced that India’s vision for the future included development of fourth-generation INSAT satellite systems, more sophisticated remote-sensing satellites and more advanced Geo-stationary Launch Vehicles.