Chandrayaan-3: Ex-Pak minister calls for live telecast of spacecraft's landing today

Fawad Chaudhry, the former minister of Pakistan’s Information and Broadcasting Ministry in the Imran Khan-led government, termed the Chandrayaan-3 mission a "historic moment for humankind". He took to X, formerly known as Twitter, to congratulate Indian scientists, people and the space community on the lunar mission.

Moreover, he stated that the Pakistani media should telecast the Chandrayaan-3 moon landing, which is scheduled to take place later today. "Pak media should show #Chandrayan moon landing live tomorrow at 6:15 PM… historic moment for Human kind specially for the people, scientists and Space community of India…. Many Congratulations," he wrote on Tuesday.

His comments on Chandrayaan-3 came after a video emerged on social media last month, where the Pakistani leader appeared to take a jibe at India's moon missions. "Itne papad belne ki zaroorat nahi hai (there is no need for such efforts)," the former minister said at a TV debate.

"Chaand jo hai najar aa jata hai, exactly uski location pata hoti hai...kis territory me uska kya altitude hoga? (the moon is visible, its location is known, and what will be its altitude in which territory is also known)," he said.

Earlier in 2019, when the lander of Chandrayaan-2 suffered a technical glitch and was unable to land on the Moon, Fawad Chaudhry took a brutal dig at the lunar mission. He criticised India for "spending Rs 900 crore" on the Moon mission and claimed it was "unwise" to venture into "unknown territory".

Chandrayaan-3 spacecraft set for Moon touchdown today

Meanwhile, India is at the cusp of scripting history, as Indian Space Research Organisation's (ISRO) ambitious third Moon mission Chandrayaan-3's Lander Module (LM) is all set to touchdown on the lunar surface on Wednesday evening, making it only the fourth country to do so, and first to reach the uncharted south pole of Earth's only natural satellite.

The LM comprising the lander (Vikram) and the rover (Pragyan), is scheduled to make a touch down near the south polar region of the Moon at 6:04 pm on Wednesday.

"All set to initiate the Automatic Landing Sequence (ALS). Awaiting the arrival of Lander Module (LM) at the designated point, around 17:44 Hrs. IST," ISRO said in a post earlier.

Chandrayaan-3 is a follow-on mission to Chandrayaan-2 and its objectives are to demonstrate safe and soft-landing on the lunar surface, roving on the Moon, and to conduct in-situ scientific experiments.

Also Read: Chandrayaan-3 moon landing LIVE updates: Less than 3 hours to go! ISRO all set to initiate automatic landing sequence