Mission Mangal, the latest Bollywood flick will release this Independence Day, a perfect means of driving the nationalistic enthusiasm of the countrymen towards a higher level. The movie as the name suggests is based on a fiction story depicting the ISRO scientists who led India’s first interplanetary expedition to the planet of Mars. The expedition was accredited primarily to the efforts of women scientists at ISRO. There has also been a growing controversy surrounding Akshay Kumar’s role in the film and paradoxically towards a man selling a story centered around women. Sceptics argue that having a male lead in the film is synonymous with the weaker representation of women. However, this would not be a fair verdict to pass before watching the movie in its totality.
Real Story Behind Mission Mangal
Regardless of what the film may reveal, the actual story is inspiring. Narendra Modi announced the mission on 15th August 2012. The fifteen months that were to follow carried along with them intense conceptualization, planning, and finally, the implementation of the mission. The days spent at ISRO demanded heavy schedules, mounting pressure and draining fforts with consecutive 20-hour workdays, endless permutations and combinations followed by rigorous testing. But all sacrifices were worth the effort when the women (and the men) working on this project could see the big picture. They could feel the passion that arose from undertaking such kindness while serving your very own country. Credit goes to the family of these women who stayed supportive in their endeavors and encouraged them to
keep their spirits alive
Minal Rohit one of the project manager on MOM (Mars Orbiter Mission) said,
” We think of our satellites and payloads as our babies too, to us, they have lives. So, the rules for office and home are common: Patience, Procedures, Priorities. If you’re patient, that’s half the battle won. Don’t allow for single-point failure; have backup plans in your mind all the time to avoid chaos.”
The journey of this mission was difficult yet when the road came to an end, the team of scientists could see in front of their eyes nothing but an auto-rickshaw sized satellite that was successfully sent out of the earth’s orbit into Mars, while conquering a journey of about 660 million kilometers within a time span of thirty days. The total cost of the satellite was a sum of $70 million which is cheap considering the Hollywood movie “Gravity” was done on a budget of $100 million.
The news of the film arises during a time when India is emerging as a leader in space exploration and contributing towards scientific progress of mankind with its launch of Chandrayaan 2, making India the fourth country to achieve a soft landing on the Moon. We eagerly await this film, and congratulate the nation for its great success.
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