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Our Country in Mars

Good Morning, ..

Mars is the fourth planet from the Sun and the second smallest planet inthe Solar System, after Mercury. It is often described as the "Red Planet"because ofthe iron oxideprevalent on its surface.

The exploration of Mars has taken place over hundreds of years. Mars has longbeen the subject of human fascination. Probes sent from Earth beginning in the late20th century have yielded a dramatic increase in knowledge about the Martian systemfocused primarily on understanding its geology and habitabilitypotential.

In its quest to explore Mars, the Soviet Union, the US and European SpaceAgency have successfully explored Mars, that too after several attempts. The firstattempt was made in the year 1960 by the Soviet Union. Chinas and Japans attemptto explore Mars failed. Exploration to Mars have large failure rate out of 51attempts, only 21 have succeeded.

Now ISRO, the Indian Space Research Organisationhas joined the elite group ofSpace Agencies to launch the Mars Orbiter Mission called the Mangalyaan on Mars.What is more interesting is that ISRO has achieved this in its first attemptMangalyaan was launched on 05 Nov 2013 from Satish Dhawan Space Centre, SriHarikota in Hyderabad abroad Polar Satellite Launching Vehicle C-25. After 298 daysof transit it was successfully inserted into Mars Orbit on 24 Sep 2014.

Mangalyaan was achieved on a budget of Dollar 74 million, which is nearly 10th

of the amount spent by US Space Agency NASA for sending MAVEN to Mars. It is a

commendable feat of ISRO that it has achieved a successful launch, at a price thatwould put other space agencies to shame.

The Mission is a Technology Demonstrator project to study Mars surface,mineral composition and scan its atmosphere for methane. The Mars mission aims toachieve goals by digging deeper into the secrets of the red planet. The orbiter wouldalso measure relative abundance of hydrogen in its upper atmosphere and tointrospect the history of water in this planet. The mission promises to generate usefulengineering and scientific data that could be useful for future research.

The Mars mission comes as a welcome reliefto our country facing the problems

of economic slowdown, poverty, mal nutrition, sanitation and hygiene. It also raisesour morale and the common man feels proud at our scientific achievement. Thisambitious mission has strengthened India's foothold in community of scientificnations. More enticing fact about this project is that the kids and teenagers aregetting attracted to pursue rocket science in their higher studies. This is a healthysign for the development of science and technology in the country.

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With Mangalyaan on Mars, India is fast becoming a space hubin the World andis likely to generate thousands of jobs for our engineers.

We should be really proud and salute our great scientists that with scarce

resources, they have gone beyond the boundaries and achieved the feat. Thisachievement will definitely inspirethe future generations.

Thank you. Jai Hind