BHUBANESWAR: Secretary to Department of Science and Technology (DST) T. Ramasami here on Saturday said that India's ambitious programme of sending humans into space would take time.

"We should work in a time-bound programme but must not compete with other countries to achieve the goal. Realistically speaking, all components for the satellite should be prepared by our industries within the next five years," Mr. Ramasami told The Hindu on the sidelines of a special convocation ceremony organised by a private university here.

He said there was a lot to do in this direction. "We must develop special material which could withstand a temperature of 3,000 degree Celsius. If you don't have the right kind of material, there is always a danger in the mission," Mr. Ramasami said.

The DST Secretary observed that the launch of 550-kg capsule by the Polar Satellite Launch Vehicle was carried out with extreme precision and scientists were moving in this direction step by step.

Main challenge

Pointing that in the Cold War era, the US and the USSR were competing with each other for scientific excellence. Now, India and China were viewed as two players in the same race, he said. "Sending a human to moon should not be our ultimate mission. We must look beyond that." He underlined the need of growth of industries around this scientific pursuit. "We have developed one of the best imagery processes in the world by using our satellite research. Scientists have also been successful in developing super computers. The main challenge before us is to create a mass of scientific minds in the country to carry forward all programmes," Mr. Ramasami said.

Inspiring programme

He said the government was going to present innovation awards to one million children between the age of 10 and 17 over the next five years to encourage scientific thinking.

The Innovation in Science Pursuit for Inspired Research (INSPIRE) programme, which is to be implemented in the next five-year plan, would surely fructify government's attempt to persuade more students to study science, the DST Secretary said.

"Further, we will be facilitating interaction of the top one per cent of Class 10 students with global icons of science in summer camp to achieve our goal."

Speaking at the convocation ceremony, he said: "The number of people who compete 10th and 12th grades in India has increased from 70 million in 1991 to around 247 million in 2004. The number of graduates has increased from 20 million to around 49 million in same time. With a large youth population, India is emerging as the land of hope for educated people for the knowledge needs of the world."

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