PM, student-winners to watch live soft landing on Moon from ISRO’s Bengaluru centre

BENGALURU: Around 70 students from across the country will be watching live India’s proposed soft landing on the moon in the early hours of Saturday, along with
Prime Minister Narendra Modi.

Two top scoring students in ISRO’s online space quiz contest from each State and Union territory have been invited by the space agency to watch at its centre here the landing of
Chandrayaan-2’s “Vikram” module on the Moon.

“…about 70 students in total. They will be watching the landing live along with Prime Minister,” a senior ISRO official said.

To increase awareness about the space programme, an online quiz competition was conducted by Bengaluru-headquartered ISRO in coordination with MyGov.in
from August 10 to 25.

The criteria for selecting successful winners was “maximum correct answers in the shortest time.” The duration of the quiz was 10 minutes (600 Seconds) during which a maximum of 20 questions could be answered, ISRO had said.

“Two top scoring Students (from class 8 – 10 only) from each State and Union Territory will be invited to ISRO, Bengaluru Centre to watch the landing of Chandrayaan-2 on the
Moon, live along with the Honourable Prime Minister Narendra Modi,” terms and conditions of the quiz on the MyGov.in read. ‘Vikram’ (with rover ‘Pragyan’ housed inside) is
expected to touch down on the surface of the moon on September seven, between 1.30 am and 2.30 am.

A successful landing will make India the fourth country after Russia, the US and China to achieve a soft landing on the moon. But it will be the first to launch a mission to the unexplored south pole region of the Moon. (agencies)