Research and Development (R&D) is always considered the most expensive or cost intensive part of any new product. Deep pockets alone venture into the R&D playground, whether it is for spacecrafts or even a new X Box or Nintendo game console. Companies or entities developing various medicines and technologies are, understandably, very aggressive to protect their products through patent laws. In today’s situation, one is not permitted to play a song or a movie in public since it will infringe copyright laws. The world, in the last few decades, has observed a forceful international agreement in this sphere alone since it protects private enterprises which are supported by old people enjoying power in most countries. Yet the same old people seem totally unable or unwilling to sit across the table and sort out differences but instead declare war where millions of lives are lost or affected. Intellectual property rights hold the greatest value in the modern system.
In this background, some citizens are surprised, once again, on learning that nine employees’ associations of the Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) have sought answers from its chairperson V Narayanan over the proposed handing over of the organisation’s core strength of manufacturing and operational functions to private entities, currently being labelled as public sector undertaking (PSU) but raising wider questions about the future of India’s premier space institution and the rationale behind such a sweeping shift. Building a stronger private space industry could be a welcome step, but dismantling and handing over a super expensive public institution, constructed from scratch with billions of rupees of taxpayers’ money is a whole different deal. To top it, that organisation alone built the country’s space capabilities in the first place and has boasted about the cost effectiveness of the hardware it has produced. Private participation in clearly defined commercial activities can coexist with a strong, publicly owned ISRO. What seems like a ‘deal’ is accepting a policy that puts ISRO in only the costly research and development (R&D) role while transferring the production of the nation’s launch vehicles, along with the operation of its launch infrastructure, from public to private hands. It is to be understood that when a private entity is formed, since none exists in India at present, to produce space vehicles and do the launches, they will automatically be handed over the currently in use infrastructure and related facilities which are national properties. These transfers, like the airports and sea ports being sold off to Adani Enterprises in the recent past, are for a fraction of the building investments. Every single citizen is forced to pay high taxes but is kept completely in the dark about the manner her hard earned money is being utilized for certain individuals’ growth.
The ISRO employee associations have sought clarity after Pawan Goenka, chairman of the Indian National Space Promotion and Authorisation Centre (IN-SPACe), reportedly said that eventually ISRO would not make or manufacture launch vehicles and that this work would be undertaken by private companies or PSUs. They have asked whether the design, development, realisation, integration, testing and launching of PSLV, LVM3, SSLV and their successors will remain with ISRO or handed over to commercial entities.
Goenka, later last evening, has come out with a clarification that ISRO’s role is not being diminished and that it will remain the bedrock of India’s space initiatives. This is the style of kite flying that the present system resorts to in such delicate issues before pushing through with a bill in Parliament and solidifying its wishes.
The government’s silence is troubling. Such a fundamental change in the role of India’s premier scientific institution must not be announced indirectly through public servants. If the policy is indeed to move core space hardware manufacturing capabilities out of ISRO, the government owes us, the People, its scientists and the parliament a transparent explanation.
The timing is particularly disturbing because hundreds of ISRO scientists and engineers have reportedly resigned or opted for voluntary retirement in recent times. Among those leaving are experienced personnel whose expertise has been built over decades. In response to the exodus, the Department of Space had tightened the rules governing resignations from critical programmes. But preventing scientists from leaving is not a substitute for understanding why they want to leave in the first place. The thinking of these experienced scientists and technicians, as discussed on social media, could sound logical. Some claim that these qualified personnel are unwilling to sell their intellectual property rights to a profit-seeking privately owned enterprise for a meagre government salary. They had been doing that till now for the development of the country and not for any individual benefiting from their hard work. If there be private profitability, it is only just that they too receive benefits for their research at an international scale.
A space programme depends upon institutional memory, the accumulated knowledge of engineers and scientists who have designed rockets, investigated failures, solved problems and learnt from successive missions. In the US, the research and development done by NASA over the decades are not simply copied by Jeff Bezos’ Blue Origin or Elon Musk’s SpaceX. These private players also do parallel research, and they endure losses and mishaps too. Since knowledge cannot be instantly recreated by private companies in India, they will piggyback on ISRO and all the infrastructure created for and by it since 1969.
When experienced personnel leave while ISRO’s manufacturing responsibilities are simultaneously eroded, the country risks weakening the very ecosystem that produced its space successes.
The government’s hyper-enthusiasm for privatisation also reflects a larger ideological problem. Under the Modi government, privatisation and the transfer of public assets to private hands have increasingly been presented as unquestionable signs of economic modernisation. Understandably, strategic national assets should never be treated like loss-making commercial enterprises waiting to be sold or disinvested. Handing over Air India was an example. The quality of service, punctuality or security for flyers has not improved. ISRO is not similar or merely another, public-sector organisation, its achievements are the product of decades of public expenditure as Indian taxpayers financed its laboratories, launch centres, research programmes and infrastructure. At the same time, generations of scientists transformed that investment into technological capability that ultimately belongs to the nation and not any individual enterprise that does not exist as of now. It will go for registration only when the government is fully prepared to hand over everything a few months later.
The space sector has a strategic dimension that makes any attempt to go for an all-out privatisation policy a risky proposition. Launch vehicles, satellites and associated infrastructure are essential to communications, navigation, weather forecasting, disaster management and national security. A country that outsources too much of these can eventually become dependent upon private companies for capabilities it once controlled directly. This is nothing but self-sabotage.
All said and done, it is indeed a fundamentally wrong idea that the state should finance the creation of a strategic asset and then retreat once its capabilities become commercially valuable.