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U.S. astronaut carrying Tricolour

— Photo: AP

INDIAN CONNECTION: Mission specialist Andrew Feustel leaves the Operations and Checkout building to board the space shuttle Atlantis at the Kennedy Space Center in Cape Canaveral on Monday. Mr. Feustel, married to an Indian, is carrying the Indian flag with him.

CHENNAI: American astronaut Andrew Feustel, who is flying aboard space shuttle Atlantis, is carrying the Indian national flag with him because he is married to an Indian, Indira Bhatnagar, who belongs to Ambala, Haryana, and he “loves India.”

Mr. Feustel is a geophysicist who will undertake three spacewalks. This will be the shuttle’s final maintenance mission to the Hubble space telescope.

According to Ashima Bhatnagar, who is related to Indira, Mr. Feustel’s love affair with India began with his marriage to Indira and introduction to Indian food. Indira is the daughter of Dr. Vijay Mohan Bhatnagar of Ambala, now settled in Cornwall, Canada.

“Within months of the historic Chandrayaan-1 mission, the Indian flag will again leave the confines of gravity and take its place in space,” Ms. Ashima Bhatnagar said. Mr. Feustel can speak a few words in Hindi and called his last trip to India in 2007 “out of the world,” she added.

Mr. Feustel and Indira met when they were students at Purdue University in the U.S., said Sandeep Bhatnagar, Commissioner of Customs (Exports), Chennai and father of Ms. Ashima. The shuttle mission’s commander is Scott Altman.

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