Article Posted on : - Mar 17, 2025

The screenshot image is sourced from the website of United Nations Office for Outer Space Affairs (UNOOSA). Photo: Indian Space Research Organisation (GODL-India).

Credit: ISRO, JAXA, PTI, PIB

On September 18, 2024, the Union Cabinet of the Government of India has accorded approval for two significant space science missions, viz. the Venus Orbiter Mission (VOM) to study different facets of Venus including its surface and atmosphere, and the Chandrayaan-4 mission, which is meant to collect lunar samples and bring back the same to the Earth.

In March 2025, the Govt. of India accorded approval for the ambitious Chandrayaan-5 mission to study the Moon, as per PTI news report quoting ISRO Chairman V Narayanan.

These missions will be major stepping stones to achieve Honb’le Prime Minister’s Space Vision 2047, which envisions India being one of the most impactful space-powers with the Bharatiya Antariksha Station in orbit by year 2035, and Indians having landed on the Moon with indigenous technologies by year 2040.

The Chandrayaan mission consists of studying the lunar surface. Chandrayaan-1 successfully launched in 2008 took chemical, mineralogical and photo-geologic mapping of the Moon. The Chandrayaan-2 mission (2019) was 98 per cent success but just two per cent of the Mission could not be achieved in the final stages. Chandrayaan-3 Mission is a follow-on mission to Chandrayaan-2 to demonstrate end-to-end capability in safe landing and roving on the lunar surface. Chandrayaan-3 mission with the Lander Vikram successfully 'soft-landed' on the South pole of the Moon on August 23, 2023, as per media reports.

Chandrayaan-4:

Chandrayaan-4 mission will achieve the foundational technologies capabilities eventually for an Indian landing on the moon (planned by year 2040) and return safely back to Earth. Major technologies that are required for docking/undocking, landing, safe return to earth and also accomplish lunar sample collection and analysis would be demonstrated. The Chandrayaan-4 Mission expected to be launched in 2027 aims to bring samples collected from the Moon. As per ISRO, the Chandrayaan-4 mission will be India’s fourth mission to the Moon. The first two missions, viz. Chandrayaan-1 and 2 have studied the Moon’s surface, sub-surface and exosphere in a global scale, from orbiter platforms. Chandrayaan-3 has been the first-ever successful lunar soft-landing and robotic exploration in the Southern polar region of the Moon. It has conducted in-situ studies of the lunar surface, near-surface plasma, and recorded, for the first time, lunar ground vibrations in the Southern polar regions. The spacecraft (Chandrayaan 4) would comprise five modules - Ascender Module (AM), Descender Module (DM), Re-entry Module (RM), Transfer Module (TM), and Propulsion Module (PM). The five modules are planned to be launched as two stacks; DM + AM in one stack and TM + RM + PM as the second stack, onboard two separate LVM3 launch vehicles. Figures 4 and 5 depict the stacks of the Chandrayaan-4, comprising different modules.

Chandrayaan-5/LUPEX:

Chandrayaan-5/LUPEX mission is a joint lunar mission by India's ISRO and Japan's JAXA. JAXA has formed a partnership with the Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) to implement the Lunar Polar Exploration (LUPEX) project. According to JAXA, the LUPEX project is an initiative aimed at exploring the Moon for water and other resources and gaining expertise in exploring the surface of the Moon. The LUPEX project is an international cooperative project, with JAXA in charge of the lunar rover and ISRO responsible for the lander that will carry the rover; observation instruments from NASA and the European Space Agency (ESA) will also be mounted on the rover. The rover being developed by JAXA will drive on its own to search for areas where water is likely to be present and sample the soil by digging into the ground with a drill. ISRO has advanced technological capabilities that it has applied to operating lunar orbiters and developing lunar landers and rovers, and the LUPEX project will have to build a larger lunar rover than ISRO has developed to date, as noted by LUPEX project members INOUE Hiroka and FUJIOKA Natsu of JAXA.