Written by: Somya Muralidharan
The Satish Dhawan Space Centre in Sriharikota successfully launched Chandrayaan-3, India's third lunar mission, on July 14 at 2:35 PM IST. In the upcoming weeks, it will have travelled more than 300,000 kilometres to get to the moon. A roar of joy ripped through the roofs of Indian homes as soon as Chandrayaan-3 soared into the sky.
Following the crash-landing of Chandrayaan-2 in September 2019 due to a software error, Chandrayaan-3 is a follow-up mission. Chandrayaan-3 has various upgrades that ISRO learned from Chandrayaan-2 to guarantee success this time. On August 23, it will reportedly touch down on the Moon. With a successful mission, India would join the United States, China, and the former Soviet Union at the head of the space race.
Chandrayaan-3 consists of an indigenous propulsion module, lander module, and a rover with an objective of developing and demonstrating new technologies required for inter-planetary missions. The propulsion module will carry the lander and rover from injection orbit to till 100 km lunar orbit. It also carries a Spectro-polarimetry of Habitable Planetary Earth (SHAPE) payload to study the spectral and polarimetric measurements of earth from the lunar orbit.
The expedition is being led by Dr. Ritu Karidhal Srivastava, one of the senior scientists at ISRO. She is referred to as India's "Rocket Woman" for playing a crucial part in the development of India's Mangalyaan Mars Orbiter Mission, which involved designing and implementing the craft's onward autonomous system. She served as this mission's deputy operations director as well. One of ISRO's greatest successes was Mangalyaan. India became the fourth nation in the world to reach Mars as a result.
Ritu Karidhal was born in Lucknow, Uttar Pradesh. She was raised in a middle-class family that valued education highly. She was forced to rely only on her own desire for success due to a lack of resources, the absence of coaching institutions, and the high cost of coaching.
Ritu Karidhal had known since she was little that she was interested in space sciences. She spent hours staring at the night sky and pondering the universe. She was interested in the moon and how it changed in size and shape; she also looked at the stars and wondered what lay in the darkness of space. She began gathering newspaper clippings regarding any space-related activity in her teen years and kept tabs on ISRO and NASA activities.
She received her MSc in Physics from Lucknow University in 1996 and is a renowned scientist in the Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO). She also completed her MTech at the Indian Institute of Science (IISc) at Bengaluru's Department of Aerospace Engineering.
Ritu Karidhal Srivastava joined ISRO in 1997. Since then, she has won a number of awards for her efforts, including the Women Achievers in Aerospace Award in 2017, the ISRO Team Award for MOM in 2015, and the ISRO Young Scientist Award in 2007 from former president of India, APJ Abdul Kalam.
Pic credits: Ted Talks India
She has significantly aided India's space programme and is a skilled engineer and committed leader. She serves as an inspiration to many individuals all around the world and is a role model for women in STEM professions. Srivastava has contributed to numerous major ISRO missions, including the Mars Orbiter Mission (Mangalyaan), the Chandrayaan-1 and Chandrayaan-2 missions, the GSAT-6A mission, and the GSAT-7A mission. She has published more than 20 papers in international and national journals.