Congratulations pour in for ISRO on new milestone

Congratulations poured in for ISRO on Friday after it successfully put into orbit its own earth observation satellite Cartosat, nano satellite NIUSAT and 29 foreign satellites from 14 countries, with President Pranab Mukherjee and Prime Minister Narendra Modi tweeting their greetings.

President Mukherjee wrote: "Congratulations to ISRO team on the successful launch of PSLV-C38 carrying 31 satellites."

"Congratulations to ISRO on its 40th successful Polar satellite launch carrying 31 satellites from 15 countries. You make us proud," the Prime Minister wrote on Twitter.

Congress President Sonia Gandhi and Vice President Rahul Gandhi also congratulated the Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO).

Sonia Gandhi expressing her admiration for the scientists, said: "With every successful mission, ISRO has set new standards in bringing space technology closer to people and meaningful end uses."

Finance and Defence Minister Arun Jaitley tweeted: "Congratulations #ISRO on achieving another milestone by successfully launching 31 Polar satellites from 15 countries & making India proud!"

"Congratulations ISRO on the launch of Cartosat-2 series. Science in service of humanity-proud of our space scientists for making it happen," said Rahul Gandhi on Twitter.

BJP president Amit Shah tweeted his congratulations; "Kudos to @isro on the successful launch of PSLV-C38/Cartosat-2 Series Satellite carrying 30 Co-passenger Satellites from 15 countries."

Kerala Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan also tweeted his greetings at @CMOKerala.

The rocket Polar Satellite Launch Vehicle's (PSLV) main cargo was India's 712 kg Cartosat-2 series satellite for earth observation with a design life of five years.

The other 30 satellites weighing 243 kg were from 14 countries - Austria, Belgium, Britain, Chile, Czech Republic, Finland, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, Latvia, Lithuania, Slovakia, and the US - as well as one Indian nano satellite, NIUSAT.

The whole mission got over in around 23 minutes.

--IANS

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