NEW DELHI: The country’s first unmanned space flight under the Gaganyaan programme before the final human spaceflight mission is scheduled to be launched in December this year, Union finance minister Nirmala Sitharaman announced as part of the Budget on Monday. She also said that “2021 will be the year of Chandrayaan-3”, a successor to the Chandrayaan-2 moon landing mission launched in 2019. She also proposed to launch a ‘Deep Ocean Mission’ with a budget outlay of more than Rs 4,000 crore over five years.
“As part of the Gaganyaan mission activities, four Indian astronauts are being trained on Generic Space Flight aspects in Russia. The first unmanned launch is slated for December 2021,” the FM said in Parliament. The first unmanned flight was initially scheduled to be held in December last year but had to be postponed due to the pandemic. Two unmanned GSLV rockets each carrying a humanoid (a robot simulating human forms) will be tested before the human flight carrying 2 or 3 gagannauts is launched.