Excitement and tension

SHILLONG: He was a bundle of excitement as he walked into the control room of ISRO’s Telemetry, Tracking and Command Network (ISTRAC) facility in Bengaluru hours before Chandrayaan 2 was scheduled to land on Moon.
Ribait Phawa, a Class X student of Ramakrishna Mission Higher Secondary School, Sohra, was among over 70 students from across the country invited to watch history-in-the-making along with Prime Minister Narendra Modi; He would become part of that history, too.
Ribait won his passport to witness the historic spectacle from where the Chandrayaan 2 was scripted, after tasting success in the Space Quiz 2019 organised in collaboration with ISRO.
Before leaving here for Bengaluru, Ribait expressed his happiness for having been invited to witness the event with the Prime Minister.
“It is only with my superlative performance that I have been able to achieve this goal,” he said while expressing his gratitude to the principal, teachers and parents for their encouragement and support.
“He was excited to the point of having goose bumps as he went inside the ISRO facility here,” Kasturi Maharaj, hostel in-charge at Ramakrishna Mission Higher Secondary School told The Shillong Times from Bengaluru late on Friday evening.
Kasturi Maharaj accompanied Ribait to Bengaluru along with his mother.
“We were not allowed in,” he said.
“The excitement here in Bengaluru over the Chandrayaan mission is palpable,” Kasturi Maharaj said. He quoted a friend and member of Team Chandrayaan 2 to say that there was “excitement and tension.”
“Tension because after all, you don’t know what’s going to happen,” he said.
He said security around the ISRO facility was very tight. “Ribait and other students were not even allowed to wear their watches ad carry their pens inside the ISRO,” he said adding that they were provided with T-shirts which they had to wear.
“But all said and done, it is a terrific feeling to be here in Bengaluru on this day. Let’s just pray for the best and hope the rover Pragyaan rolls out of lander Vikram tomorrow morning and charts a new path in India’s and the world’s space history,” he said.