India's space programme creates history, Mangalyaan enters Mars orbit

India's space programme created history early on Wednesday morning with the Mars Orbiter Mission, Mangalyaan, successfully entering the Martian orbit.

Commenting on the success of India's first inter-planetary mission called "MOM", scientist Amitabh Pandey said, "This is a very important thing for India and a great achievement. The big success is that it's a good start for India"

"I want to say that Mangal is our future. We have to go and stay there. This is very short starting," he added.

The insertion operation of the spacecraft was performed at the scheduled time 7.17.32 this morning and lasted for the prescribed 24 minutes.

On Monday, ISRO scientists successfully test-fired the mission's main engine.

Given the high rate of failures, only 21 out of 51 missions sent to Mars by various countries have been successful, and the success of India's Mars orbiter Mission in the very first shot will boost her global standing in space.

Mangalyaan is primarily a technological mission and has been configured to carry out observation of physical features and the atmosphere of Mars.

The Mars Orbiter Mission affectionately called "MOM" was India's first inter-planetary mission launched on November 5, 2013 from Sriharikota in Andhra Pradesh.

Mangalyaan has been on a 300-day marathon covering over 670 million kilometers.