The maiden human space flight to Mars would be a global mission through a consortium by 2030, a top Indian space official said Wednesday.
'Manned mission to Mars will be a global effort and will be undertaken by a consortium of space-faring nations,' Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) chairman K. Radhakrishnan told reporters here.
Noting that international collaboration and cooperation would be the order of the day in future space exploratory missions, Radhakrishnan said the global endeavour would be to put a man on the red planet by 2030.
'Since a human space flight to Mars is not only prohibitive, but also demanding as the journey alone would be about 250 days, the ambitious mission will pose scientific and technological challenges to all space agencies,' Radhakrishnan said on the margins of a an event.
The National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) of the US and the European Space Agency (ESA), a consortium of space-faring nations in Europe, signed an agreement in October 2009 to expand collective capabilities, resources and expertise for exploration of Mars.
As a leading space-faring nation, India with its low-cost but high-end launch vehicle technology will be a part of the international consortium for the manned mission to Mars.
'India will be associated with other space-faring agencies in the manned mission to Mars, with scientific experiments to be carried on the Martian surface,' Radhakrishnan said after releasing a book titled 'Moon Mission: Exploring the Moon with Chandrayaan-1'.
The book on India's maiden unmanned lunar mission is authored by S.K. Das, a former member (finance) of the space department.
Referring to the second lunar mission (Chandrayaan-2) scheduled for launch in 2012-13, the Indian space agency chief said it would repeat some of the experiments carried by Chandrayaan-1 and its unfinished task as it was aborted 10 months after its launch Oct 22, 2008.
'Chandrayaan-2 will land a Rover on the moon to collect samples and relay the data back to the earth,' Radhakrishnan noted.