Women pilots likely for manned mission in future, says ISRO

New Delhi, October 22

Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) chief S Somanath on Sunday said women could join human space missions in the future as astronauts or scientists.

Somanath said astronauts for the proposed Gaganyaan mission, India’s first human spaceflight mission, have been selected from among the Indian Air Force’s (IAF) fighter test pilots.

Since there is no woman fighter test pilot, no woman could be chosen for this mission, which is expected to take place sometime in 2025. “That would change when women fighter test pilots would be available,” the ISRO chief said.

Somanath said the second route for women to go to space would be as scientists. Like foreign space agencies, India also wants to send scientists in space for doing research. It also has plan to set up a space station during the next decade. Somanath said next year a female humanoid (robot with the appearance of a woman) would be sent on unmanned test flights of the launch vehicle for the Gaganyaan mission. India’s ambitious Gaganyaan mission got a shot in the arm on Saturday when it successfully carried out a test to check out crew escape system developed for the mission.

Till date, only one Indian, Wing Commander Rakesh Sharma (retd), has been to space. In 1984, Sharma went to space as part of an India-Soviet Union joint mission.

Earlier this week, Prime Minister Narendra Modi held a high-level meeting to review the Indian space programme and announced that India would have a space station by 2035 and humans on the Moon by 2040.