THIRUVANANTHAPURAM: The manufacturing of PSLV, ISRO's trusted rocket, will be handed over to the private sector. ISRO will stop the direct manufacture of PSLV. Instead, they will build a more powerful rocket.

To mark this, the booster motor of the PSLV XL version, built by a private company in Pune, was successfully tested yesterday at the rocket launch center in Sriharikota. With this, it was assessed that the private sector has achieved the capacity to manufacture the PSLV rocket. It is reported that all the parts of the rocket will be manufactured in the private sector and only testing and assembling will be done at ISRO.

The PSLV rocket engine technology was handed over to a private company in 2019. It is a joint venture between Hindustan Aeronautics and L&T. The newly formed New Space India Limited is supervising this.

Built in 1980, PSLV has so far launched 319 satellites of 33 countries. In 2016, 104 satellites were launched at once, making history.

PSLV is being handed over to the private sector for two reasons. What is important is the assessment that PSLV is not suitable for the new era. ISRO is working on a more powerful rocket. The second reason is that its manufacture is time consuming and not enough rockets can be built because there are too many launch missions. Each rocket takes months to build. Hence there is a limit to the number of successive launches. Also, research missions require more time.

ISRO Chairman Dr. S. Somnath had stated that the policy stance is not to build PSLV anymore. With that, the steps to manufacture rocket components in the private sector accelerated.

At the same time, it is not clear whether the manufacturing and casting of the critical parts of the rocket will be outsourced. Foreign space agencies including NASA are following this method.