THIRUVANANTHAPURAM: Vikram Lander and Pragyan Rover befriended the moon on day one itself. The propulsion module orbiting the moon has been operational since Sunday. Its device called SHAPE is sending data to Earth.

ISRO's ISTRAC centre in Bengaluru said that all the equipment on the lander and the rover are working perfectly. Instruments like ChaSTE, ILSA and RAMBHA on the lander were turned on yesterday. After leaving the lander, the rover started moving slowly. The rover will study the soil and surrounding mineral composition. Information from this will be transmitted to Earth. Both lander and the rover will work for fourteen days.

At the same time, the lander sent back a two-minute video and some pictures to Earth yesterday. This video is just a description of the surface.

Google celebrates the victory

'Blue sky...Full moon winking as ISRO's Vikram lander orbits...Moon's face lighting up and smiling as Pragyan rover soft-landed through the lander's entrance', this was the animation that appeared as Google Doodle yesterday in appreciation of the Chandrayaan mission.

The doodle also featured Earth sharing the joy of the moon. Google has also prepared a special page showing the journey of Chandrayaan, which took off from Sriharikota on July 14 and soft-landed at 6:04 pm on Wednesday. The page explains how the Moon's south pole is important to astronauts. The South Pole, which no one has yet touched, is estimated to hold water, hydrogen and air for the future. The caption also says that the whole world is happy with India's success.