IIT-B’s student satellite in final stages, will hand over to ISRO next year

According to students, the major problem, which significantly delayed Pratham, was that a number of senior team members passed out of college, leading to a lack of quality workforce in 2012. The programme almost went into cold storage with the stakeholders in a dilemma over whether to revive the programme or scrap it. Meanwhile, IIT-Kanpur’s nano-satellite ‘Jugnu’ was launched into space by ISRO in 2011.

“In December 2012, the team was on the verge of finishing their work and almost all the tests were successfully conducted at the ISRO satellite centre in Bangalore. We, however, could not get the launch slot. In the meantime, most of the seniors, who were part of the project, graduated. The programme had seen four project managers between 2007 and 2012. We started contemplating whether we should shut the programme. After a discussion with faculty members, it was decided that there was no point in closing the project as several research papers had already been published and lot of hard work had gone into the initiative,” said Shantanu Shahane, project manager, Pratham.

Accordingly, a team of 20 students was selected in April 2013 and trained for the project. A second round of recruitment was done subsequently. “At present, we have a dedicated team of 40, of which around 15 are new and in the process of being trained,” he added.

The Rs 1.5-crore project is nearing its end with final tests being carried out at IIT-Bombay. The students are now busy testing the electrical hardware under simulated space-like conditions. The MoU with ISRO has now been extended till March 2016, and the current handover date is April 2015.

Once successfully in orbit, Pratham will record the electron count of the ionosphere, which can be used for tsunami alerts and also to increase the accuracy of Global Positioning System in India. “The project is running as per schedule and by April 2015, the complete satellite will be handed over  to ISRO. They will subsequently decide upon a launch date,” said Shahane.
mihika.basu@expressindia.com