Almost everyone, at one point of time in their lives, has thought about going to the moon. However, for the majority of people out there, this childhood fantasy will always remain just a dream. But the same cannot applied to every person in the world; in fact, there are people, albeit very few in number, who are so dedicated to fulfilling this fantasy that they won’t hesitate to turn over every rock in order to live their dream. Rahul Narayan, an IT professional from India, belongs to that rare group.
Rahul Narayan, despite belonging to a middle class family, has invested almost his entire savings, so that he can watch his dream come true. He is actually one of the founders of the aerospace organization, Team Indus.
Team Indus is a for-profit organization; its headquarters is located in the capital of India, New Delhi. This is the first and the only team who is carrying ahead India’s flag in the Google Lunar X Prize Mission which began in 2007. The main aim of this mission, also known as Moon 2.0, is to design and land a robot on the Moon. After the robot lands on the Moon, it has to travel a minimum of 500 meters and also send feedback back to the Earth. This is definitely a daunting task, but the members of Team Indus have never backed away from such challenges.
Team Indus will be competing with 29 other teams for the grand prize worth 20 million USD. In fact, the team has already made significant progress and is already ahead of several teams participating in the competition. In January, 2015, Team Indus received 1 million USD, along with 5 teams, for having completed their landing system test.
The team is hoping to successfully complete the mission before any other team. They have even decided to launch two rovers on the moon. One will complete the main task, while the other will be tested for endurance and other additional tasks, which is worth another 5 million USD.
The most surprising fact about this team is that none of the members in this team had any background in aerospace research, yet through hard work and dedication, they have reached this stage. They were also fortunate to have members of ISRO help them in this task; ISRO will also be providing its PSLV rocket needed to launch the rovers in space.
Rahul Narayan belongs to a middle class family, but that has not stopped him from attempting to achieve his dream. Watching how much success his Team Indus has achieved, Dr. Krishnaswamy Kastuirangan, a renowned Indian space scientist has stated – “Team Indus is an opportunity to bring about transformative change”. People like Rahul Narayan and other important members of the Team Indus are the key to bringing about a huge change in India. Their creativity, innovation and hard work has shown that no matter how big someone dreams, he or she can definitely achieve it one day.