Chandrayaan - 3: a step forward for ISRO and a giant leap for mankind!

Yesterday, India / Bharat created history when its space program agency ISRO managed to land a rover on the moon. Over the course of next 14 Earth-days (equivalent to one lunar-day), the rover will conduct experiments and revert with information on multiple aspects such as the lunar soil composition, ice / water availability, etc. With this, India has become the fourth nation in the world to land a rover / vehicle on the moon and the first one to land it on the far side of the moon, close to its south pole.

The whole country, nay the whole humanity, watched this feat live with bated breaths and heaved a collective sigh of relief upon its successful outcome. The 'successful failures' of the past such as the Chandrayaan-2 mission from 2019, the rigour, toil and sweat that was invested by the ISRO team into this mission over the past four years, reached fruition and laid down the foundation for even more ambitious missions in the future. As the Indian prime minister Shri Narendra Modi said in his speech - the day is not far now when journey to the moon becomes commonplace in some years from now.

It was truly a moment of pride for all of us, a feeling of shared excitement and marvel that traversed the length and breadth of the country and its diverse denizens!

Sharing below a link to an article that expounds on how the Vikram lander (containing the Pragyan rover in its belly) achieved a near-perfect soft landing with the help of Artificial Intelligence and Machine Learning capabilities built into its Automatic Landing Sequence / System.

Chandrayaan 3 to land today; Vikram Lander will be controlled by AI, ML not ISRO scientists (firstpost.com)

Have a read through and let me know your take on this event.

I for one hope that it spurs a collective ambition and efforts across the world in terms of setting and achieving superlative goals that benefit the whole of mankind. More particularly, hoping that more Indians believe that India's rightful place in the world order as a force for the collective good is now and here and that they ought to do the best they can in their current jobs to contribute their bit towards it.