Gambhir salutes spirit of ISRO

Former Indian cricketer and BJP lawmaker Gautam Gambhir on Saturday hailed Indian Space Research Organisation's (ISRO) great spirit and said the best is yet to come.

Following ISRO's announcement of communication loss with 'Vikram Lander', Gambhir in a tweet said, "It is only a failure if we do not learn from our setbacks. We will come back stronger! I salute the great spirit of team @isro for making a billion Indians dream together, as one. The best is definitely yet to come #Chandrayaan2," Gambhir tweeted.

Earlier, ISRO in a tweet had said "This is Mission Control Centre. #VikramLander descent was as planned and normal performance was observed up to an altitude of 2.1 km. Subsequently, communication from Lander to the ground stations was lost. Data is being analyzed. #ISRO".

ISRO had lost communication with Vikram Lander of Chandrayaan 2 moments before it was preparing to make a soft-landing on the South Pole region of the Moon.

In the wee hours of Saturday, ISRO chairman K Sivan announced that communication with the lander was lost at 2.1 km from the lunar surface.

"Vikram lander's descend was normal and as planned till 2.1 km. Subsequently, communication with Vikram lander was lost. Data is being analysed," Sivan had said.

The Vikram Lander successfully separated from Chandrayaan-2 Orbiter on September 2. The Chandrayaan-2 Orbiter continues to orbit the Moon in its existing orbit.

The Vikram lander was planned to land on the far side of the moon between 1:30 am to 2:30 am on the intervening night of Friday-Saturday. This would have been followed by rover (Pragyan) roll-out between 5:30 am to 6:30 am.

After revolving around the Earth's orbit for nearly 23 days, the craft began its journey to the moon on August 14.

The mission took off from the Satish Dhawan Space Centre in Sriharikota on July 22.

India's second mission to the moon was approved by the cabinet on September 2008, just before the launch of Chandrayaan 1.