India’s space economy is projected to surpass $40 billion by 2040, while it definitely has the potential to even breach the $100 billion-mark between now and then, India’s Science and Technology Minister Dr Jitendra Singh has said.
Delivering the keynote and inaugural address at an event ‘Campus Dialogue’ at the Central University of Kashmir in the north Indian city of Srinagar on Saturday, Singh remarked that even sky wasn’t the limit for the Indian space sector after the country successfully landed its lunar mission Chandrayaan-3 on the Moon’s South Pole in August.
Only three other countries—Russia, the US and China—have been able to successfully to land on Moon’s surface.
“India’s quantum leap in space research with India’s space economy standing at $8 billion has only been possible due to the courageous decision taken by Prime Minister Narendra Modi to unlock the space sector from the shackles of the past,” stated the Indian minister.
In July, global consultancy Arthur D Little projected in a report titled ‘India in Space: A $100 Billion Industry by 2040’ that the nation’s space industry would grow to $40 billion by 2040 due to “increasing government expenditure” and “rapidly growing investment” in the private sector.
Indian Space Industry on Par with US: Singh
Singh said that the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP)-led government had “created a supportive ecosystem” for the companies in the space industry.
“India today is at par with countries, such as the United States which commenced their space journey decades before us,” the minister stated.
Singh noted that a growing number of space start-ups had come up in the country in the recent years due to relaxation in norms for entry of private players in the critical sector.
Singh had told the Indian Parliament in August that the government had approved the ‘India Space Policy’ 2023 to further increase the role of non-government entities (NGEs), or private companies, in the country’s space industry.