Evolution of a space programme

REACH FOR THE STARS - The Evolution of India's Rocket Programme: Gopal Raj; Viking, Penguin Books India; 11, Community Centre, Panchsheel Park, New Delhi-110007. Rs. 395.

THIS REVIEW is best begun in the words of Vikhram Sarabhai to answer those who questioned the viability and economics of a space programme in a developing country (Speech delivered on February 2, 1968, at the dedication function of Thumba Equatorial Rocket Launching Station): ``We do not have the fantasy of competing with the economically advanced nations in the exploration of the moon or the planets or manned space.''

Instead, he had a vision that a strong science and technological base would enable India to leap-frog some of the stages of development which the Western nations had passed through. So he effortlessly won the support of the Government of India not only for building operational satellites but also for launching them.

This is a gigantic project. It demands expertise in integrating multi-disciplines such as aerodynamics, structures, material science, electronics and control engineering, mechanical and chemical engineering, computer and software engineering.

How this formidable programme was accomplished, right from the evolution of the space programme (1963) to putting communication satellites into geostationary orbit (1994) is described by the author, with the commitment of a professional historian.

He has taken enormous care, without plunging the readers into dense thickets of technical data and detail, to develop in a gripping style technical intricacies of sounding rockets, building a launch vehicle and establishing a new launch site at Sriharikota, Andhra Pradesh, creating a base in solid propulsion including the barter arrangement with the French, the ``Robinson Crusoe'' approach in developing liquid propellant stages and finally the contribution of the Augmented Satellite Launch Vehicle.

Simple sketches are the hallmark of the presentation. Injecting a satellite into a precise orbit requires more than brute force provided by propulsion. Onboard systems have to be designed to guide the launch vehicle along a trajectory. This topic forms the core of chapter seven. Sarabhai had foreseen that communications, direct TV broadcasting, remote sensing and meteorology would be the most important applications that satellites could provide for our country. So naturally chapter eight runs to 67 pages dealing with the complex and wholly indigenous guidance system resulting in the first Polar Satellite Launch Vehicle (PSLV).

The saga of the cryogenic upper stage to replace the top two stages of the PSLV is narrated in the concluding chapter. Finally in October 1994 with the first successful launch of the PSLV, India achieved Sarabhai's dream of building and launching application satellites.

Gopal Raj has not only fulfilled the objective ``to tell the tale of what all these people together achieved in the field of launch vehicles'' but deals skilfully to show the management capability that had to be developed in a new field. This is an important contribution.

The vision, the direct style of functioning and the total faith Sarabhai had in the capabilities of his young team comes out vividly at several stages in the book.How the team - Satish Dhawan (concurrently Director, Indian Institute of Science, Bangalore), Brahm Prakash, Abdul Kalam - functioned and the management style developed with emphasis on completing a project on schedule is narrated at length.

There was less a rosy side, not suppressed from the readers: the rivalry for the top post, the pecking order in the technology development group and in the awards during the Republic Day Honours in 1980, the severe criticism the ASLV project team faced after the ASLV failure and the depths of despair the launch vehicle teams endured.

The author is to be congratulated for giving a holistic account of the whole space programme. He has captured the spirit of management in action, different from the theory of management `gurus'. This is an erudite, well-referenced, eminently readable book that maintains the interest and excitement of the reader.

It will serve as a source-book for research workers and should be welcomed by universities, higher technological institutions and institutes of management.

R. PARTHASARATHY

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