The successful launch of NASA’s lunar mission is a giant leap for mankind as it marks a new dimension of space exploration. This is the first crewed journey to the Moon since NASA’s last crewed lunar mission in 1972, but the four astronauts who began their historic journey on Thursday morning will not land on the Moon’s surface this time but will go around it during their nearly 10-day-long Artemis-II mission. The successful beginning of the Artemis-II crewed mission has triggered speculations of a space race between the United States and China, as NASA has planned an Artemis-IV mission in 2028 for a crewed landing on the surface of the Moon two years ahead of China. The euphoria over the Artemis-II mission has also put the spotlight on India’s Gaganyaan programme by the Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) that also includes a crewed lunar mission by 2040. India has already established its spectacular progress in space explorations, and the ISRO accomplishing the epoch-making Chandrayaan-3 mission made it the first country to reach the lunar south polar region and the fourth country to accomplish a soft landing on the Moon. Successful completion of crewed space missions to the Moon is critical to demonstrating technological advancement, operational readiness and endurance for long-duration crewed space missions to Mars and beyond. Information shared by the central government in the parliament outlines the framework of ISRO’s upcoming space missions. The government told the parliament that after proving the basic capabilities for human space activities under the Gaganyaan Programme, the next logical step is to initiate the development activities for a human habitat or a space station in low Earth orbit to enable longer human space missions. ISRO’s ambitious Moon landing by 2040 will be preceded by India putting up its own space station under another crucial long-term space programme- Bharatiya Antariksha Station (BAS) by 2035. India elevated its space programme to a new echelon of global influence when Indian Air Force Group Captain Shubhanshu Shukla, an astronaut from ISRO’s Gaganayaan pool, scripted history by serving as the Mission Pilot of Axiom-4 Mission to the International Space Station (ISS) and conducting important experiments on floods and nutrition during his 18-day-long stay in ISS. His safe landing on Earth on July 15, 2025, boosted confidence in ISRO scientists to advance its space programmes with a spark of fresh excitement. Another important milestone achieved by ISRO last year is the Space Docking Experiment (SPADEX) mission, which successfully demonstrated autonomous docking and undocking, along with power transfer between satellites, and made India the fourth nation to demonstrate docking in space. The SPADEX mirrored India’s strategic advancement in achieving self-reliance for independent space exploration. ISRO’s target to accomplish the Chandrayan-4 Mission in 2028 is pivotal to paving the way for the dream crewed lunar mission. The Chandrayan-4 Mission is planned for returning with lunar samples but what sets it apart from Apollo Mission of United States and Luna Mission of Russia returning with lunar rock and soil samples is that those lunar samples were of similar geological nature, but India plans the return of lunar samples from the southern polar region. According to ISRO, it is essential to study different kinds of lunar samples returned from diverse geological zones of the Moon to get a complete picture of the Earth-Moon system during the origin and formative days of the Moon. “This requirement, to a certain extent, was met by the Chinese Chang’e-5 lunar mission, which returned lunar samples from a geologically young zone, thus facilitating the understanding of the thermal history of the Moon,” states an IRSO release that highlights the global significance of India’s space mission in the context of advancing space science and exploration. The Parliamentary Standing Committee on Science and Technology, Environment, Forests and Climate Change has underlined the need for “a clear and pressing need for a comprehensive legal framework to regulate, authorize, and oversee space activities in the country in view of the rapid expansion of space activities in recent years, their increasing strategic and security implications, and the growing participation of non-governmental entities in the space sector. The Committee, however, observes that ISRO continues to rely on foreign vendors for certain critical components and technologies. The government implementing the recommendation by the Committee for identification of the areas by the Department of Space where the country is still reliant on foreign vendors and proactively supporting start-ups in these domains through funding, technology transfer, and market access will go a long way to prevent delay in building required capabilities. The Department of Space is undertaking a comprehensive long-term assessment of the number of launch pads and spaceports that India may require over the next thirty years, as recommended by the Committee, and operationalisation of the third launch pad at Sriharikota by 2029-30 remains crucial for the success of future space missions.