Renowned space scientist no more
PUNE, Oct 22: Eknath Vasant Chitnis, who along with Vikram Sarabhai laid the foundation of India’s space programme, breathed his last here on Wednesday, family members said. Chitnis had turned 100 in July. He was unwell for the past few days and suffered a heart attack Wednesday morning, they said. A visionary scientist and an institution builder, Chitnis played a crucial role in selecting the site for India’s first rocket launch at Thumba in Kerala. A meeting attended by the first prime minister Jawaharlal Nehru, Sarabhai and Chitnis in February 1962 at the Physical Research Laboratory in Ahmedabad laid the foundation of India’s space programme. The Indian National Committee for Space Research (INCOSPAR) was established on February 13, 1962, a few days after the meeting. A Padma Bhushan recipient, Chitnis played a key role in the Satellite Instructional Television Experiment (SITE), a collaborative effort between NASA and ISRO, that took educational programmes to 2,400 villages across six states using NASA’s ATS-6 satellite, which was considered a precursor to the direct-to-home television broadcast. He was instrumental in launching the Indian National Satellite System (INSAT) programme and establishing remote sensing applications. (PTI)
Govt to procure fast patrol boats for armed forces
New Delhi, Oct 22: The government plans to procure six fast patrol boats for the armed forces, essentially required to acquire capability of small team insertion for “surveillance and reconnaissance”, according to the Request for Proposal (RFP) issued for it. The opening date for the ‘Request for Technical and Commercial Proposal for Procurement of six fast patrol boats (FPBs) under Buy (Indian-IDDM) category’, is October 21, and the closing date is January 13, 2026. ‘Buy (Indian-IDDM)’ category refers to the procurement of products from an Indian vendor that have been indigenously designed, developed and manufactured with a minimum of 50 per cent indigenous content on cost basis of the total contract value. (PTI)
