Mars Orbiter Mission: How ISRO’s Ritu Karidhal led operations in outer space

I think the human race has no future if it doesn’t go into space. — Stephen Hawking

‘Into Outer Space, Launching Mangalyaan, Mars Orbiter Mission Ritu Karidhal, Moumita Dutta, Nandini Harinath, Minal Sampat, Indian Space Research Organisation,’ reads the invitation sent out by the Indian Women Network-CII Maharashtra for ‘WomeNation: Power of Us’, a two-day summit on Indian women achievers in September 2016. ‘India’s rocket women’ are scheduled for a 45-minute session, longer than the ‘Women in Media’, ‘Durga in the Boardroom’ and ‘Lunch and Networking’ sessions scheduled around it. It is an instant draw for me.

I have only a hazy recollection of what these women scientists actually did during the Mars Mission two years ago, and am eager to know a lot more. I enter the large hall with several neatly arranged round tables with spotless white tablecloths, crystal glasses and water jugs. The audience comprises mostly women from the corporate sector, who have all paid to attend this celebration of women professionals in diverse fields. Some appear to be senior management leaders busily giving muted instructions to others at their tables, while the majority are young, stylish professionals at junior and middle-management levels, along with a smattering of entrepreneurs and students.

Not all of them are paying close attention to the speakers onstage: the room is humming with the usual low-pitched conversation and distracted texting. Polite applause greets the end of the mid-morning session.

The session moderator introduces the women I have battled two hours of stressful Mumbai traffic to hear — Ritu Karidhal, Minal Sampat and Moumita Dutta, the Mangalyaan scientists *who happen to be women’. Nandini Harinath could not make it due to work assignments elsewhere.

For the next hour, as these three women held the audience and the organizers equally spellbound, an idea slowly gathered shape in my head. With slides and statistics, drawing word pictures and vivid diagrams, the ISRO scientists took the largely non-scientific crowd through a journey into the cosmos. They spoke of incredible tasks completed within impossible deadlines, juggling between family and work, the diverse challenges and moments of accomplishment. It was an all-too-brief glimpse into the realm of the unknown, of interplanetary travel, of possibilities and promise.

Soon, the impending lunch break cut short the proceedings, leaving little time for questions from the obviously impressed audience. A few did manage to ask the scientists about their work schedules, the pressures, their coping strategies and Minal, Moumita and Ritu took turns to answer.

Within sixty minutes, overshooting their allotted time, they clearly owned the room. Though the entire interaction was clearly aspirational for the women-centric audience, one phrase in particular stayed with me: We worked on the mission during the day, we often worked nights as well, and in between we looked after our children and families'. This, a throwaway statement by one of the scientists, was accompanied with laughter and acquiescence from the others.

This matter-of-fact attitude, the underlying confidence shining through the ‘balancing act’ they professed to perform on a daily basis, is perhaps the most striking characteristic of the ISRO women scientists. They reminded me of the iconic Tata Steel ad of the early 1990s — ‘We also make steel’.

I decided to skip the post-lunch sessions devoted to the other women achievers and went looking for the Mangalyaan scientists. They were preparing to give pre-arranged interviews to a women’s TV channel. Before the interviews began, I asked them if I could meet them for another interview — at much greater length to write a book about their accomplishments. All three looked visibly pleased but told me they were not allowed to grant interviews without prior clearance from their organization. I would need to get in touch with the public relations director at ISRO headquarters in Bengaluru. With my permissions secured, I started my own mission over the next few months, to get to know these magnificent women and their flying machines.

Ritu Karidhal: Deputy Operations Director, Mars Orbiter Mission

Four months later, I sit patiently at the reception desk at URSC (U R Rao Satellite Centre, formerly ISRO Satellite Centre) in Bengaluru, waiting for the stamped papers that would allow me to carry my Dictaphone and mobile phone inside the premises, so I could record my interview with the Deputy Operations Director, MOM, Ritu Karidhal.

The URSC complex has a sprawling old-world charm, incongruous to the elaborate security measures. An impressive canopy of greenery with ancient, gnarled trees and several rows of recently planted additions liven up the otherwise staid government structures on campus.

Armed with the required pass, I enter the main building where my bags and person are checked again, before being politely waved through to the first floor.

I wait for Ritu in the airy, well-appointed room and she enters exactly on time in an elegant salwar kameez, which prompts compliments from the secretary who follows with a coffee tray.

Ritu has a pleasant face and a slightly stocky build. She wears rimless spectacles and a red bindi. She has a quiet, earnest air about her and an unhurried way of talking especially while explaining complex scientific procedures.

As she speaks eloquently about slingshot manoeuvres’ and the velocity near the perigee and apogee’, I begin to wish that I had paid more attention in my school physics class. Noticing my confusion, she patiently gives me a crash course on the basics of how the Mars Orbiter satellite operates.

Then we backtrack a little to her childhood dreams and aspirations. A flashback reveals an uncommon fascination with the universe, particularly the moon. When I was quite little, maybe three or four years old, I remember we used to travel by those hand-pulled rickshaws in my hometown, Lucknow. And I would think the moon is walking with me wherever I go. When I slept on the terrace, I would feel the moon following me everywhere. So I’d wonder about it, and ask myself these questions even before I went to school,’ recalls Ritu.

I ask her what sparked this curiosity so early in her life.

‘I was a calm and quiet child, who didn't talk much and preferred to read. Even in the extreme summers in Lucknow, I remember I would get lost in my book and forget to switch on the fan. And then my mother would come in, scolding me and asking me to rest,’ says Ritu, smiling nostalgically.

At school Ritu was a good student, excelling at mathematics. She also had a vivid imagination. I would picture myself surrounded by numbers, writing poems related to mathematics,’ she chuckles. School was fun, with supportive teachers encouraging her enthusiasm for science, along with her parents.

“Twenty years ago there weren't too many opportunities for girls in small towns. We didn’t have a lot of facilities. Even going to college from my home, I had to take a rickshaw or auto or bus. Travelling wasn’t easy but I had that inner passion, that curiosity to know and to do something. That perseverance convinced my parents to support my studies. In so many families, girls cannot do this. They are only expected to work at home. This kind of thinking decelerates their growth.’

After a six-month stint teaching physics at Lucknow University, Ritu was selected for her very first job at URSC, ISRO, in Bengaluru. She had always kept a meticulous track of what ISRO and NASA had been doing, reading and preserving newspaper clippings about landmark events, such as the first NASA rover landing on Mars in July 1997. She had also looked out for ISRO’s advertisements for vacancies, and when one did come, she quickly applied. Her graduation and post-graduation grades in physics (later followed by an MTech in aerospace engineering from IISc, Bengaluru) and her performance at the ISRO interview led to an immediate selection.

(Courtesy Speaking Tiger Books)