Pragyaan imprints India on moon - வதனமே சந்திர பிம்பமோ?

Great fan of Tamil Cinema – have the habit of quoting Cinema songs ! especially to your lover – perhaps you come down a cropper !! 

வதனமே சந்திர பிம்பமோ? மலர்ந்த சரோஜமோ?

மாறன் அம்போ? நீள் விழியோ? மதுர கானமோ?  

ஐயுற வேண்டா !!  -  தமிழ் பாடலே !!  -   முகர் என்ற வினைவேர் மூக்கினால் ஒன்றினை முகர்ந்து பார்ப்பதைக் குறிக்கிறது. முகத்தை நீட்டுமாறு, அசைக்குமாறு செய்வதற்கு முகரும் வினையே காரணமாகிறது.  முகத்திற்குத் தமிழில் வழங்கப்படும் பிற சொற்கள் -  மூஞ்சி, முகரை என்பன.  மூய் என்றால், எல்லாம் முடியும் இடம். நெருங்கிச் சூழ்ந்த நிலைக்கும் மூய்தல் என்று பெயர். புலன்களின் நெருங்கிச் சூழ்ந்த இடம் என்ற பொருளில் மூய் என்ற வினையோடு 'தி' என்ற விகுதி சேர்ந்தது. மூய்தி என்ற சொல்லே மூஞ்சி ஆனது (தெலுங்கில் மூத்தி).  முகத்திற்கு மற்றோரு பெயர் "வதனம்"

கவிதைக்கு பொய் அழகு !  - கவிதை என்பது ஒப்பிடல்.  பண்டை நாள் முதலே, அழகு முகத்தோடு, முக்கியமாக காதலியின் அழகு முகத்துக்கு - சந்திரனே உவமை.   இந்த பிரபல பாடல் பாபநாசம் சிவன் இயற்றியது.  1943ல் வெளிவந்த சிவகவி என்ற படத்தில் எம்.கே. தியாகராஜ பாகவதர் மத்யமாவதி, ராகத்தில், ஜி. ராமநாதன் இசைக்கு பாடி நடித்தது.  TR  ராஜகுமாரி கதாநாயகி  

When one chooses travel destination -  one thinks of water, drinking water and opulence of water, may be river, lake or sea.   Obviously, humans need to drink water to survive, and water molecules can be split into hydrogen and oxygen. Oxygen provides air to breathe, and hydrogen and oxygen can also be used as rocket propellants to get back home to Earth, or somewhere else in the solar system.  

The polar regions of the Moon,  are different. Many parts lie in a completely dark region without sunlight, and temperatures can go below 230 degrees Celsius. This creates difficulty in the operation of instruments. In addition, there are large craters all over the place. As a result, the polar regions of the Moon have remained unexplored. The extremely cold temperatures could mean that anything trapped in the region would remain frozen in time, without undergoing much change. The rocks and soil in Moon’s north and south poles could therefore provide clues to the early Solar System.  

The Moon is busy with its visitors – not one, but TWO from India — a lander named Vikram and a rover named Pragyan — landed in the southern polar region of the moon on Wednesday. The two robots, from a mission named Chandrayaan-3, make India the first country to ever reach this part of the lunar surface in one piece — and only the fourth country ever to land on the moon.  

A Lander does not have wheels; it has stilts, or legs, which are supposed to touch down on the lunar surface, the legs of Chandrayaan-3 have been strengthened to ensure that it would be able to land, and stabilise, even at a speed of 3 m/sec, or 10.8 km/hour.  The Chandrayaan-3 Lander has solar panels on four sides, instead of only two in Chandrayaan-2. This is to ensure that the Lander continues to draw solar power, even if it lands in a wrong direction, or tumbles over. At least one or two of its sides would always be facing the Sun, and remain active.  

The great news is the rover came out after the lunar dust had settled down completely. Chandrayaan-3 landed on the lunar south pole on August 23, 2023, at 6:04 pm IST.   After the Vikram lander was powered completely, the Pragyan rover came out. It took the Pragyan rover over four hours to roll out completely. Together, the Pragyan rover and Vikram lander were called the lander module.  

A lunar rover or Moon rover is a space exploration vehicle designed to move across the surface of the Moon.  The rover has a mass of 26 kilograms, a mission life of one lunar day (14 days), and a power generation capacity of 50 Watts.  Pragyan is rectangle-shaped, and has six wheels and a navigation camera.  

According to ISRO, the mission’s three objectives are to demonstrate a safe and soft landing on the lunar surface, to demonstrate a Rover roving on the Moon and to conduct in-situ scientific experiments. Pragyan (Sanskrit: प्रज्ञान) literattly means ‘wisdom’. It is the name of the rover of Chandrayaan-2 and is the rover for the Chandrayaan-3 mission.     

At the heart of the historic achievement is the Pragyan rover, is also imprinting  India's national emblem, the Lion Capital of Ashoka at Sarnath, and the ISRO logo on the surface of the Moon. The wheels of the Pragyan rover have been adorned with the ISRO logo and the national emblem, showcasing the Lion Capital of Ashoka at Sarnath.  

S. Somanath, the director of Indian Space Research Organization, has described the current moment as an inflection point, as the country opens its space programs to private investors after half a century of state monopoly that made advances but at “a shoestring budget mode of working.” 

There would be more visitors to the mon – the next is to be launched on Aug 26 -  called Smart Lander for Investigating Moon, or SLIM, and comes from Japan’s space agency, JAXA.  

Following the successful completion of the lunar project, shares of 13 Indian space-sector companies, including PTC Industries Ltd, Zen Technologies Ltd. and Centum Electronics Ltd., rallied and added more than $2.5 billion in market value this week, according to data complied by Bloomberg. The Make in India programme dates back to 2014, the first year of the Narendra Modi government’s first term in office, and is aimed at attracting investments in the manufacturing sector. Since then, the government has focussed heavily on indigenising a space programme that so far leaned heavily on foreign manufacturers.  

Moon has enamoured mankind and poets have been describing the beauty of their beloved comparing to Moon – here is the close-up face of Moon as seen by Chandrayaan !!  The Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) has shared the first images of the Moon captured by Chandrayaan-3 during lunar descent. Chandrayaan-3 also captured an image of the landing site. In that image, one of the landing legs of Vikram can be seen. Chandrayaan-3 chose a relatively flat surface for landing.  

With regards – S Sampathkumar
24.8.2023