Mangalyaan vs Maven

On the 24th of September our esteemed space research organisation ISRO made history. It successfully placed "Mangalyan" into the Mars orbit. The entire sequence to slow down the vehicle and get itself "captured" into the martian gravity was autonomous. The commands to fire the rocket were uploaded much earlier as the orbiter was eclipsed by Mars itself and the ground control stations on Earth had no access to the orbiter's communication system during this time.

Our Prime Minister on this occasion spoke. As always he spoke brilliantly. He also made a point about the cost of the project being less than the movie "Gravity". Now, that set the stage for the social media to go abuzz with all sorts of comparisons.  People started comparing the NASA's MAVEN mission and the cost that it incurred. Some of my friends commented that the mission was 11 times more costlier than that by ISRO. Impression was made that ISRO was "one-up" against NASA in this.

We Indians have a habit of exaggerating things we feel proud of (as a nation or community) especially if the thing appears to be comparable to something from the West. We go over the board swelling our chest with pride and brag about our achievement. We often at these times ignore the facts of the case.

Precisely, what we have done in this case. First and foremost, ISRO has/had no plans to go "one-up" against NASA in anyway with this mission. The honourable chairman has himself stated that ISRO is in race with no one but itself. Secondly, "Mangalyaan" weighs around 4.3 times lighter than MAVEN. Anybody with a basic knowledge of rocket science knows that with each gram increase in weight of the payload the cost of the launch (and the carrier) goes up. Thirdly, "Mangalyaan" is just like a "Hello World" programme by ISRO to test out their capability of carrying out an interplanetary mission. The scientific instruments "Mangalyaan" carries are very basic unlike those in MAVEN. It is true that NASA has asked for co-operation with ISRO for the use of the methane gas sensor that "Mangalyaan" carries with itself.

Yes we have made a huge achievement in our own might. We are sure that ISRO will bring us even more reasons to smile (esp. with the upcoming PSLV C26 launch and our own IRNSS navigation system and the much awaited GSLV MKIII launch) in the coming years. But please do not demean other space programmes or nations. The fact of the matter is that as of date we are the "youngest" nation in space exploration.

So I request fellow compatriots to keep calm.