Leaders across party lines back ISRO on Chandrayaan-2

Several political leaders across party lines on Saturday said that Indian Space and Research Organisation (ISRO) scientists should not be disheartened with Chandrayaan-2's lander going offline and expressed hopes that India will succeed in its next attempt.

Senior Congress leader Rashid Alvi hailed the ISRO scientists' "great work" and said that the country has full faith in them.

"Our scientists have done great work. Name of our nation reached great heights with the launch of Chandrayaan-2. We have full trust that our scientists will achieve success soon," he told ANI here.

BJP leader Tom Vadakkan also backed the space agency. "We are proud of them. Failure and successes are part of life and we believe that the next step will be towards success. The entire country is behind them," he said.

Former Madhya Pradesh Chief Minister Shivraj Singh Chouhan said that the scientists should not lose hope, saying that the next attempt will give an incredible result.

"Our scientists made incredible and commendable efforts. Sometimes we don't get the desired results even after tremendous efforts. The people who try never get defeated. We will try this again and the end result will be incredible and there is no need for the scientists to be disappointed," he said.

Congress leader Meem Afzal said that the Vikram lander's loss of connection with the ground station sent the nation into a shock. "Sometimes, we do not get the result which we were expecting, the Chandrayaan-2's case is one among them. This was shocking for the entire nation," he said.

Afzal also lauded Prime Minister Narendra Modi for consoling the scientists after the lander stopped sending signals to ISRO in the wee hours of Saturday.

Chandrayaan-2, India's second lunar mission, was launched on July 22. The lander was expected to soft-land on the south pole of the moon between 1:30 am and 2 am on Saturday but it lost contact with the ground station when it was 2.1 kilometres above the lunar surface.