Question : Launch of Satellites

(a) the details of total number of satellites launched in the country till date;
(b) whether the Government has set any target to improve the living standards of the people by launching the satellites particularly for agriculture, education, fishing, healthcare, etc.;
(c) if so, the details thereof;
(d) whether all the targeted objectives have been achieved successfully till now;
(e) if so, the details thereof, if not, the reasons therefore; and
(f) whether the Government is taking any effective measures to ensure still better performance of the satellite programs in the country and if so, the details thereof?

THE MINISTER OF STATE IN THE MINISTRY OF PERSONNEL, PG & PENSIONS AND IN THE PRIME MINISTER’S OFFICE
(DR. JITENDRA SINGH):

(a) As on date, 89 Indian satellites have been successfully launched by Indian Space Research Organisation. In addition, ISRO has also launched 9 Student Satellites and 237 customer satellites from 28 foreign countries.

(b) & (c)
The satellite enabled data and services are being used to improve the living standards of people. These include Television broadcasting, Direct-to-Home, ATM, Mobile communication, tele-education, tele-medicine and advisories on weather, pest infestation, agro-meteorology and potential fishing zones. Satellite data is also used for crop production estimation, crop intensification, agricultural drought assessment, wasteland inventory, identifying ground water prospect zones, inland aquaculture suitability and disaster risk reduction. ISRO has plans to launch more number of state-of-the-art satellites to further enhance operational applications and cater the needs of emerging applications.

(d) & (e)
Many of the applications have been effectively adopted by stakeholder departments for operational use. A few of such applications include: Potential Fishing Zone Forecast & Ocean State Forecast (by Indian National Centre for Ocean Information Services, MoES), Crop Acreage and Production Forecasting & National Agricultural Drought Assessment and Monitoring System (by Mahalanobis National Crop Forecast Centre, MoA&FW), Biennial Forest Cover Assessment (by Forest Survey of India, MoEF&CC), Irrigation Infrastructure Assessment (by Central Water Commission, MoWR, RD&GR), Weather forecasting (by India Meteorological Department, MoES), Ground Water Prospect and Suitable Recharge Locations’ mapping (MoDW&S), Integrated Watershed Management Programme & MGNREGA (by MoRD).

(f) In order to ensure better performance of the satellite programmes, a National Meet was organised in September, 2015, with the participation of all the Central Government Ministries/Departments, for enhanced utilisation of space technology in Governance and Development. Further, to promote utilisation of space technology in State Government departments, State level workshops have also been conducted in 17 States. Other measures include (i) conduct of user interaction meets and utilization programmes; (ii) capacity building for space applications; (iii) creation of an outreach facility; (iv) development of geospatial tools and information systems; (v) Proof of Concept demonstration; and (vi) Institutionalisation of space applications.

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