Context:

• Recently, Prime Minister Narendra Modi publicised the final shortlist of candidates to be astronauts on board the maiden human spaceflight mission — called Gaganyaan — of the Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO). 
• Assuming two important test flights this year and the next are successful, the first crewed flight of the mission is scheduled for 2025. 

What is Gaganyaan Mission? 

• Gaganyaan is the name of the ISRO mission to send Indian astronauts to low-earth orbit for a short duration, onboard an Indian launch vehicle. 
• Technically, it is a demonstration mission: it will test various technologies required for human spaceflight, which remains the most complicated form of spaceflight, and demonstrate India’s familiarity with their production, qualification, and use. 
• ISRO also set up a coordinating body for Gaganyaan called the Human Space Flight Centre (HSFC). 

What are the components of Gaganyaan? 

• • The Launch Vehicle Mark-3: The LVM-3 is the launch vehicle. Formerly called the GSLV Mk-III, it is a three-stage rocket. 
    • The first stage comprises two solid-fuel boosters strapped to the rocket core. 
    • The second stage is powered by two liquid-fuelled and clustered Vikas 2 engines. 
    • The third stage has the CE-20 indigenous cryogenic engine with liquid hydrogen and liquid oxygen as fuel and oxidiser, respectively. 

• The orbital module: The 8.2-tonne orbital module is the object the LVM-3 rocket will launch and place in low-earth orbit. 

• • It consists of the crew module and the service module. 
  • The crew module can house up to three astronauts for a week. It includes parachutes to slow its descent to the ground once it descends from orbit; an environmental control and life-support system (ECLSS; to control the temperature, breathing environment, waste disposal, fire protection, etc.); and the crew escape system, which the astronauts can use to escape in case the rocket malfunctions during its ascent. 
  • The service module contains the propulsion system required to raise the orbital module’s altitude once it separates from the rocket and later to propel it back towards the earth. 
• The crew: Of the first four astronaut candidates, Prashant Nair, Ajit Krishnan, and Angad Pratap are group captains and Shubanshu Shukla is a wing commander, all in the Indian Air Force (IAF). 
• The crew module will include a gynoid (feminine robot) named ‘Vyommitra’ fit with sensors to track the effects of radiation and weightlessness, monitor capsule conditions, and sound alarms in the event of an impending emergency, aside from being able to perform some other tasks. 

What will Gaganyaan achieve? 

• Indian Space Policy 2023 provides an overview of what the Indian space programme will aim for in the coming decades as India joins a host of countries going to space, the moon, and beyond while conducting scientific, commercial, and exploratory missions. 
• This new ‘space race’ extends geopolitical boundaries drawn on the earth into outer space. 
• The result is a heavy premium on the human presence of different nationalities for longer durations in space and on the moon. 
• Against this backdrop, Gaganyaan will establish India’s self-sufficiency vis-à-vis sending humans to space, on timelines it can control, instead of relying on expensive contracts with foreign launch services — and in step with other efforts to represent India in the final frontier.