Dr. Jitendra Singh
Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s just-concluded visit to the United States is historic in the sense that it has established India as a major global power for years to come. India and the United States are entering an era of technology-driven common collaboration, and this collaboration marks the beginning of a journey of which Prime Minister Narendra Modi has said, “the sky is not the limit.” In fact, the credit goes to Prime Minister Narendra Modi, who has taken several unconventional and path-breaking innovative decisions during the last 9 years, which have enabled India to grow rapidly in key sectors. For example, the United States of America, which began its journey into space many years before India, today invites India as an equal partner in its future endeavours.
On 21 June, India became the 27th country to sign the Artemis Agreement, during a ceremony at the Willard Inter-Continental Hotel in Washington. The Artemis Agreement establishes a practical set of principles to guide civilian space exploration cooperation between nations for peaceful purposes. This enables India to participate in the US-led Artemis program to explore the Moon and other celestial bodies. It is worth noting that this agreement will pave the way for the relaxation of restrictions on the import of critical technologies in the space sector, especially related to electronics, which will benefit Indian companies to develop systems and innovate for the US markets. It will also facilitate India to jointly partner in other scientific programmes. Will allow access to common standards for long-term cooperation in various activities including human space flight programs and facilitate a stronger partnership with the US in strategic areas such as micro-electronics, quantum, space security, etc.
The Artemis Agreement is a non-binding agreement with no financial commitments. The agreement was signed on October 13, 2020 by the eight founding nations—Australia, Canada, Italy, Japan, Luxembourg, the UAE, the UK, and the United States. Its members include traditional US allies such as Japan, France, New Zealand, the UK, Canada, South Korea, Australia and Spain, while African countries such as Rwanda, Nigeria are new partners. Let us try to understand how India will benefit from joining the Artemis Agreement. According to one estimate, global government spending for space programs reached a record level of nearly $103 billion last year. With about $62 billion, the US government alone spent more than half of the total funding. China spent about $12 billion, followed by the US, which is not part of this group. Russia ranks 5th with an annual expenditure of $3.4 billion. India ranks 7th with an annual budget of $1.93 billion.
So let us compare the space programs of different countries in the year 2022 based on the number of orbital launches. The PayloadSpace website states that there were 186 orbital launch attempts last year, with the US 76, China 62, Russia 21 and India 5. Now, let’s compare the third major parameter—the number of satellites in space. As of 4 May 2023, there were 7,702 active satellites in various Earth orbits, according to Orbiting Now, a satellite-tracking website. US has maximum 2,926 active satellites, followed by China- 493, UK- 450, Russia- 167, while India is at 8th position with 58 satellites. India’s space program is six decades old and ISRO was established seven years later, in 1969. International collaboration has been the hallmark of ISRO and it has collaborated with various launch agencies such as Russia’s Ruscosmos and Europe’s ESA. ISRO has launched more than 385 foreign satellites from more than 34 countries.
Prior to 2014, ISRO launched satellites occasionally, but after Prime Minister Narendra Modi initiated private sector participation in the space sector, today ISRO is working with around 150 private startups. Far space missions require billions of dollars and benefit all of humanity. Therefore, it is imperative that nations use their resources for the benefit of humanity. Without losing any time, like-minded countries must come forward, collaborate and work on each other’s benefits and experiences, as Prime Minister Narendra Modi has stressed – ‘We must not work in isolation! ‘.
We probably won’t have to wait long to see the first big clear benefits of the new Indo-US cooperation in the space sector. An Indian astronaut may be sent to the International Space Station (ISS) next year. US President Joe Biden has confirmed this at the White House after a meeting with Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Thursday.
A joint statement by India and the United States during the current visit of Prime Minister Modi said that NASA will provide ‘advanced training’ to Indian astronauts at one of its facilities. Similar to both sides, other areas will also see a spurt in mutual benefits. US memory chip company Micron Technology, Inc on Thursday said it will invest up to $825 million for a new chip assembly and test facility in India’s Gujarat, which will be its first manufacturing facility in the country. A total investment of $2.75 billion will be made in this facility in collaboration with the Central Government and the State Government of Gujarat.
President Biden and Prime Minister Modi also agreed to establish a joint India-US Quantum Cooperation Mechanism to facilitate collaboration between industry, academia, and government, and to work toward a comprehensive quantum information science and technology agreement . To encourage public-private collaboration in order to jointly develop and commercialize artificial intelligence (AI) and quantum technologies and develop high-performance computing (HPC) facilities in India; A $2 million grant program is being launched under the US-India Science and Technology Lump sum Fund.
President Biden also reiterated his government’s commitment to working with the US Congress to reduce barriers to US exports of HPC technology and source code to India. The US side promised to do its best to support India’s Center for Development of Advanced Computing (C-DAC) in co-operation with the American Institute for Accelerated Data Analytics and Computing (ADAC). Also, 35 innovative joint research collaborations in emerging technologies will be funded by the US National Science Foundation (NSF) and India’s Department of Science and Technology (DST). US President Biden assured US support to India as Chair of the Global Partnership on AI. Both politicians appreciated Google’s intention to continue investing in early-stage Indian startups and others through its $10 billion India Digitization Fund.
India’s Department of Atomic Energy (DAE) will contribute $140 million to the US Department of Energy’s (DOE) Fermi National Laboratory for the collaborative development of the Proton Improvement Plan-II Accelerator’s Long Baseline Neutrino Facility, America’s largest international research facility Will be the center. In the health sector, research institutes from both the countries will collaborate on affordable cancer technology programmes, including development of AI enabled diagnosis and prognosis tools, and diabetes research.
Giving a boost to India’s civil aviation sector, Air India will buy 220 Boeing aircraft for $34 billion. The clearest sign that India-US relations are at their best is that as PM Modi mentioned in his address to the US Congress, the US today is not only India’s largest trading partner; Rather, cooperation in the defense sector underlines the trustworthy relationship. The concluding sentence of the joint statement issued at the end of Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s visit to the US may be quoted as concluding, ‘Our (India and US) ambitions are to reach greater heights…’ (Author, Union Minister of State (Independent Charge) for Science and Technology.)
