Outer space has become a critical arena of national power, economic competition, and strategic signaling. The ever-enhancing space ambitions of India signify the burgeoning centrality of space in its security calculus. Since early 1960s, India has been incessantly developing and upgrading its indigenous space capabilities and has gradually acquired substantial capabilities in civil, commercial, and military space sectors. When India began to develop its space program, it had limited national resources and focus of its space program was meeting the economic and social development needs. However, since last two decade, India is militarizing its space program to harness the multi-faceted military space applications such as Intelligence, Surveillance, and Reconnaissance (ISR), Positioning, Navigation, and Timing (PNT), precision targeting, and military communication. These developments are driven by complex interplay of geopolitics, commercial ambitions, and domestic technological and national imperatives.
Geopolitical Environment
According to various analysts, the national security concerns of India play an enormous role in furthering the space capabilities of India, particularly in military domain. According to Indian research analysts such as Rajeswari Pillai Rajagopalan, geopolitics has been the key factor in India’s quest for military space program. The continuous advances of China with respect to space warfare is a major concern for India. It perceives Chinese space based asserts such as heavy lift off boosters, anti-satellite weaponry, and other counter space weapons as potent threat to space assets of India. In 2007, when China tested its anti-satellite capability, it became a caveat for India to aptly address the emerging space security threats. In 2019, India tested its own ASAT weapon to demonstrate the counter space capabilities as a deterrence mechanism. India’s adversarial relationship with its two nuclear neighbors – China and Pakistan – is driving India to reform its space sector. Satellite diplomacy of China with Pakistan, Nicaragua, Laos, Belarus, Bolivia, and Algeria alongside remarkable space milestones such China’s quantum encrypted satellite-based communication and Beidou navigation system have prompted India to focus on amplifying its technological prowess related to outer space. India’s threat perception from Pakistan has also played significant role in shaping its core space aspirations. 1999 Kargil war revealed the loopholes in military space capabilities of India when its space assets failed to carry out continuous surveillance and remained unable to provide the intelligence, weather inputs, and targeting information vis-à-vis Pakistan. The denial of GPS during this war pushed India to develop Indian Regional Navigation Satellite System (IRNSS).
Commerical Factors
The space program of India is also driven by its quest to enhance its footprints in commercial space market. In 1992, India established the Antrix Corporation Limited, commercial and marketing arm of Indian space agency ISRO. This government owned private limited company has various aims: commercial exploitation and advancement of space products; transfer of indigenously developed technologies; technical consultancy services; and to further development of industrial space capabilities. Presently, BJP government under Prime Minister Modi has also undertaken various steps to buttress country’s entrepreneurial role in space sector. The most noteworthy development in this regard is development of ISpA-Indian Space Association in 2021 in order to further space technology. In the last few years, surge of private space industry in India has witnessed a boom, engendering various reforms and regulatory frameworks in country. Deriving commercial profits from space industry of India has become a key motive of the present Indian government. Prime Minister Modi approach to commercial space sector reforms is grounded on enabling role of government, giving freedom to private sector for technological innovation, and regarding space as an avenue for progress.
Domestic Factors
Various domestic factors also play an indispensable part in India’s quest to expand and strengthen its space program. These factors can be divided into three parts: 1) Role of space program in nation-building – from Indian prime minister Nehru to scientists like Homi Bhabha and Sarabhai, space is considered as key to nation-building and this perspective played important part in formation of ISRO. The current BJP administration also hold the similar perspective of space power projection of India and nation-building; 2) Legitimacy of government – achievements in space leads to regime legitimacy and popularity. Prime Minister Modi take lay substantial emphasis on scientific disposition towards outer space and regards it essential for national development. His election manifesto outlined the goal to make India a leading space power; 3) Space-driven national development and prestige -use of space assets in providing various national requirements such as weather forecasting, early warning for disasters, fishery, agriculture, tele-education, tele-medicine has also urged India to develop and upgrade its space program. In terms of external status and prestige, the indigenous space capability is a source of prestige and power for India.
With geopolitical imperatives, commercial interests, and domestic factors determining space program of India, one must think – Will the interplay of these drivers steer Indian space program towards strategic competition, rivalry, or collaboration?
