India now aims for manned space mission

Thiruvananthapuram, Nov 23 (IANS) India is aiming to send a manned mission into the space after the success of its first unmanned mission to the moon, Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRo) chairmain G. Madhavan Nair said here Sunday.

'The (manned) moon mission is a tough task and to achieve that our first task is to send an Indian astronaut on a manned mission to space, who will orbit the earth and return. For this, the sanction of the government has to come. We plan to achieve this by 2015,' Nair said at a reception accorded to him during his first visit to his home town since the successful launch of the Chandrayaan-1.

'The next moon mission by the US and China is fixed for 2020 and our target is that we also should be ready by then,' Nair added.

'To achieve that, the space mission would provide the necessary boost. Another thing that is being planned is Aditya, a mission to study the solar system from the earth's orbit,' said Nair.