Science and Technology Minister Jitendra Singh on Wednesday accused the previous Congress governments of "regimenting" the space department and debarring the common man and industry from it, while asserting that the Modi government has created an enabling atmosphere for the success of the country's space programme.
Participating in the debate on 'India's Glorious Space Journey Marked By Successful Soft Landing of Chandrayaan-3", he said there are 150 startups in the space sector today against only four prior to 2014 which was "embarrassing".
He also said that the space budget in the last nine years has increased to 142 per cent.
Hitting back at Congress leader Jairam Ramesh, who said that achievements of the last six decades in the space domain were ignored, the minister said the common man was earlier debarred from even peeping inside the premises of space institutions.
"Why they were kept away. You had kept the space department behind a veil of secrecy. You had regimented it. You had disallowed it to be synergised with all the stakeholders. You had disallowed the industry to indulge in this and that is why the progress halted," he told the House.
He said it took us 75 years to reach here where we have.
"Before 2014, there were four startups in space and it is embarrassing to say," he said.
"What is important is that when we started our programme in the early and mid-1960s, on the one hand you had (Vikram) Sarabhai devoid of transport and on the other hand you had Soviet Union and United States preparing to land a human on the surface of Moon. That was the gap and the difference distance between the two. Still this group of young scientists had that courage," Singh said.
He also mentioned Veeramuthuwel, the project director of Chandrayaan-3, who was sitting in the gallery, with the House lauding him with the thumping of desks.
"You have celebrated Chandrayaan, you have seen Chandrayaan and you have sung Chandrayaan. But this is the culture under the government of Prime Minister Narendra Modi," the minister said, adding that, "With all the patronage of the government, this team works in anonymity." "If there was an iota of politics, it would not have been so. It would have been otherwise," he said.
"He is there and he does not even boast to be there. And, he was appointed by the present government," Singh said, while noting that he is not a dynast.
Asserting that the House is sitting to celebrate science and scientists, the minister said our scientists never lacked capability and courage but there was lack of an enabling atmosphere at the time and cited the picture of Vikram Sarabhai carrying the launcher vehicle of space programme on a bicycle in the early days.
"Who was the prime minister and which government was there at that time," he asked.
"Our scientists never lacked talent or capability, they had integrity and the zeal to work hard and had dreams. They had the courage to do something even when they did not have anything. But, there was lack of an enabling atmosphere. And that shortcoming has now been removed now," he said while countering the charges of the opposition.
Asking what has led to this quantum leap in space sector and whether one possessed a magic wand now, Singh said something might have happened that we started tasting success. Referring to Ramesh's assertion that the space programme was not a military programme, he said the question then is if it was not a military programme, then why were the civilians debarred from entering Sriharikota premises.
"You had regimented it. It is for the first time that the gates of Sriharikota have been unlocked in 2020. Who was the prime minister at that time, I am not going to say....This debate is not about prime ministers...I do not want to go into Nehruvian blunders. I am not naming anybody," he said.
"At the time of Chandrayaan, thousands of mediapersons were present there watching the live landing," he said.
Talking about the science sector budget, he said, the budget for science has been expanded three times.
"Before 2014, there were four startups in space and it is embarrassing to say. Between 2020 and today there are 150 startups. Earlier ones have already turned into entrepreneurs. What I am trying to say is that you are trying to narrate a chronology simply to submerge the facts," he asserted.
"When you say what is new. The new is the budget itself. If you see the space budget alone, there is a 142 percent increase in budget in the last nine years. The budget of Department of space in 2013-14 was 5,168.96. The budget in 2023-24 for Department of Space is 12,543.91 crore. It is almost three time increase.
"The total budget for all the science departments in 2013-14 was Rs 21,025 crore, this year it is Rs 57,303.69 crore. For Atomic Energy, it was Rs 7,561 crore in 2013-14 and it is now up three times to Rs 27,078 crore," he asserted.
If you go for the Deparment Science and Technology, he said the budget was Rs 7,051.74 crore in 2013-14, but in 2023-24 it is more than twice to Rs 16,361.41 crore. "What more in funding. What earlier governments did not do and what this government has done," he noted.
Earlier, participating in the debate Tiruchi Siva (DMK) said he is "proud to be the citizen of India and not Bharat".
"It is a very happy moment that India is the first country to have landed on the South Pole of the Moon," he said, adding credit goes to the ISRO team and their relentless pursuit and passion.
"We, with all responsibility and pride, congratulate ISRO for taking India to a very remarkable place," he noted.
Sandeep Kumar Pathak (AAP) said the Indian space mission started even before the country's Independence and later scientists laid a strong foundation for the space mission.
He said there should be no politics in science and referred to the brain drain, while calling for equipping scientists properly.
Claiming to be a scientists himself, he also called for building a good work culture in government scientific institutions.
"If we have to develop the country, we need to improve the work culture in every government institution," he asserted.
TMC MP Jwahar Sircar said superstition cannot go hand in hand with science. Take pride in history but not at the cost of scientific temper, he noted.
If you want more Chandrayaans, Adityas, free science from bureaucracy, he noted, calling for changing the rules to promote science.
He also lamented the cut in the budget for ISRO by the Centre.
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