Latest news with #SatelliteInstructionalTelevisionExperiment
Indian Express
3 days ago
- Politics
- Indian Express
C Raja Mohan writes: Trump's techno-capitalism, tech broligarchy and India's challenge
An important anniversary in India's technological history passed largely unnoticed last week — the launch of the Satellite Instructional Television Experiment (SITE) in 1975. A pioneering collaboration between the Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) and the US National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA), SITE used the American ATS-6 satellite to beam educational programmes in local languages to over 2,400 villages across six of India's most underdeveloped states. The content included primary education, health awareness, agricultural practices, and national integration. SITE remains a landmark in the technological imagination of India's developmental state. For the US, the project was an expression of 'scientific internationalism'— the Cold War-era belief that modern science and technology could advance peace and prosperity through international collaboration. But that idealism quickly faltered. Following India's 1974 nuclear test, Washington's enthusiasm for technology cooperation gave way to non-proliferation anxieties. It would take three decades to overcome these disputes and rebuild bilateral trust. This effort culminated in the launch of the Initiative on Critical and Emerging Technologies (ICET) under President Joe Biden in 2023, aimed at reinvigorating India-US cooperation in advanced technologies. Whether ICET can survive renewed political turbulence in the bilateral relationship — marked by differences on Russia, trade, and Pakistan — remains uncertain. Yet, a more structural challenge looms: The increasingly divergent trajectories of the Indian and American technology ecosystems. Even in 1975, the SITE programme featured private sector participation. The ATS satellite was built by the Fairchild Corporation (now defunct). But in the years since, the American technology landscape has undergone a dramatic transformation. NASA, once the dominant actor in space, now shares the stage with private firms like Elon Musk's SpaceX, which conducts more launches annually than the government agency itself. Over the past two decades, America's dynamic technology sector has not only accelerated innovation but also given the US a strategic edge over its rivals. The US government continues to play a vital role — particularly in defence procurement and standard-setting — but increasingly acts as a catalyst rather than a controller. China, by contrast, has charted a different course. Since Deng Xiaoping's call for 'scientific modernisation' in the late 1970s, the Chinese state has pursued a centralised, mission-driven model of technological advancement. Decades of double-digit growth, rapid industrialisation, and heavy investment in scientific research and higher education have propelled China into the front ranks of global technological power, especially in AI and space technology. Despite starting later than India, China's civilian space programme now competes with that of the US and is expanding its global footprint through initiatives like the Digital and Space Silk Roads. India's own trajectory remains moored somewhere in between the American and Chinese models. Recent reforms have introduced greater dynamism into India's space sector, but Delhi is still some distance from fully mobilising its private sector to secure a larger share of the global space economy or rejuvenating its higher education and scientific research establishments. While India finds its footing, the global tech landscape is being reshaped by dramatic developments in the US. In recent weeks, the Trump administration has unveiled two major initiatives — on AI and cryptocurrency — that symbolise a novel approach to techno-politics. Unlike Biden, who sought to regulate and constrain Big Tech, Donald Trump has given it a free hand. In embracing Silicon Valley's libertarian elite, Trump is remaking the American state not as a regulator of big technology, but as its enthusiastic enabler. What emerges is a distinct philosophy of techno-capitalism: Unapologetically post-liberal, aggressively nationalist, fiercely deregulatory, and ambitiously expansionist. Trump's 2025 AI policy prioritises dismantling regulatory barriers, building data infrastructure, promoting AI-led manufacturing, and mobilising hundreds of billions of dollars in public and private investment. While all major economies aspire to grow AI, the combination of American capital and Silicon Valley's technological prowess sets the US apart. Trump's techno-capitalism also extends into financial innovation. The recently enacted 'GENIUS Act' marks a decisive break from the Biden administration's cautious approach to cryptocurrencies. The Act creates a framework for dollar-backed stablecoins, requiring them to be fully backed 1:1 by liquid US assets such as cash or short-term treasuries. It also mandates reserve disclosures and consumer protections, laying the groundwork for mainstream adoption of stablecoins as digital payment systems. The policy aims to reinforce the US dollar's role as the world's reserve currency and counter growing calls for 'de-dollarisation,' including from BRICS nations. Rejecting the idea of a central bank digital currency, the Trump administration is also setting up a Strategic Bitcoin Reserve and has ended prosecutions of major crypto firms initiated during the Biden years. Here too, the motivation is not just economic—it is geopolitical. At the ideological heart of this techno-capitalist revolution is Peter Thiel, a venture capitalist and co-founder of PayPal and Palantir, and a staunch supporter of Trump's tech agenda. Thiel insists that true innovation arises not from state mandates or regulatory frameworks, but from visionary entrepreneurs liberated from liberal-democratic constraints. His worldview blends libertarian individualism with a muscular nationalism that sees China as America's principal technological adversary. This marks a decisive break from the techno-optimism of the 1990s, when the rise of the internet was seen as heralding a borderless, decentralised world where the state would gradually recede. That dream proved short-lived. Governments reasserted themselves through regulation, surveillance, and digital sovereignty. Today, we are witnessing the rise of a new state-capital compact—a 'tech broligarchy' in which Silicon Valley elites and Washington collaborate to pursue technological supremacy not for utopian ends, but for strategic advantage. This alliance is central to Trump's broader effort to reconfigure global trade, finance, and security. Whether one supports or opposes this project, its ambition and momentum are undeniable. If even a fraction of the current AI hype is realised and a portion of the planned investment materialises, American techno-capitalism will loom large over the world's economic future. India cannot remain untouched by these shifts. The celebrated Indian IT sector— long a symbol of the country's global economic integration and a major contributor to its GDP—now faces serious vulnerabilities. As AI begins to automate many of the services that defined India's IT outsourcing boom, traditional jobs may disappear or become obsolete. Add to this Trump's growing hostility toward H-1B visas, and the threat to India's digital workforce becomes even more acute. India's ambition to be a major exporter of tech talent could also be undermined by the West's rising techno-nationalism and hostility to immigration. We are only at the beginning of this techno-capitalist revolution. Will its march be inevitable and triumphant? The alliance between American populism and Silicon Valley could unravel over time due to internal contradictions or commercial rivalries. But the structural shifts now underway in American techno-capitalism—and their global implications—are likely to be enduring. For India, the imperatives are clear. There is an urgent need to overhaul the domestic tech sector, expand investment in scientific research, and better integrate private enterprise into national innovation strategies. The country must also prepare its industry, workforce, and regulatory institutions for a new era of technological transformation. The writer is contributing editor on international affairs for The Indian Express and senior fellow at the Council for Strategic and Defence Research
The Hindu
5 days ago
- Science
- The Hindu
From The Hindu, August 4, 1975: NASA invites India to join space shuttle experiment
Ahmedabad, Aug. 3: The National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) has invited India to propose an experiment that could be placed in the space shuttle, scheduled to become operative in 1980. An Indian scientist can accompany the experiment in the space shuttle also, said Mr. Arnold Frutkin, Assistant Administrator for International Affairs, NASA, in an interview to a local daily here. Mr. Frutkin, who played a leading role in India's Satellite Instructional Television Experiment was here to watch its inauguration on August 1. He said the European countries participating in the research project aboard the shuttle might send a scientist. The space shuttle was the next major project of NASA after the Apollo programme had ended, he added. 'It is less costly ($12 billions) but is expected to be a major milestone in space travel as it will try the concept of reusable booster,' he said. Mr. Frutkin said the cargo bay of the shuttle would be 60 feet long and 15 feet wide. The space shuttle, well past the design stage, would also carry an entire laboratory and change the way 'you do business in space. It will make space travel cheaper,' he added. Mr. Frutkin said the costs were bound to go down if the same booster could be used over and over again.
NDTV
01-08-2025
- Science
- NDTV
From Cow Dung To Cosmos: How India Gave The World Direct-To-Home Television
Fifty years ago, on August 1, 1975, India quietly launched one of the most transformative experiments in global communication history -- the Satellite Instructional Television Experiment, or SITE. A collaboration between the Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) and the American space agency NASA, SITE not only revolutionised rural education and development in India but also laid the foundation for what the world now knows as direct-to-home (DTH) television. In an exclusive interview with NDTV, Dr Kiran Karnik, a key architect of SITE and later head of the Discovery India channel, reflected on the scale, ambition, and legacy of the experiment. "It was probably the most exciting phase of my career," he said. "And not just for me-many of us involved with SITE still say it was the most fulfilling and satisfying work we ever did." A Satellite Umbrella In Space SITE was powered by NASA's ATS-6 satellite, a technological marvel of its time. "It had a 30-foot diameter dish, something like what the NISAR satellite has," Dr Karnik explained. "You couldn't launch a 30-foot satellite directly, so they designed it like an umbrella-folded during launch and is deployed in space." This innovation enabled the first-ever direct broadcasting from space. "In many ways, this was the precursor of what today you call DTH," Dr Karnik said. "The unique thing was, this was the first time for such an experiment anywhere in the world on this scale to take television programmes out to really remote areas." Community Viewing In Remote Villages SITE wasn't just about technology -- it was about impact. The experiment reached 2,400 villages across six Indian states, including Odisha and Bihar, where electricity was scarce and floods were frequent. "We ran the TV sets on batteries because there was no power," Dr Karnik recalled. "Some of our maintenance teams had to go via Nepal during the monsoons to reach the villages." Despite the challenges, the uptime of these rural TV sets was better than urban ones. "Young engineers in their early 20s maintained these sets with such high motivation that our downtime was less than that of urban TV sets," he said. The programming was tailored to local needs-agriculture, education, science, and development. "We had area-specific, language-specific content, and a national programme that was common across all regions," Dr Karnik noted. "Head In The Stars, Feet In Cow Dung" SITE was a paradoxical blend of cosmic ambition and grassroots reality. "I might summarise it as saying, common to me and many others in ISRO: head in the stars and cow dung on your feet," Dr Karnik quipped. "At one end, you're dreaming big things out in space. On the other, you're rooted in the reality of India." The ground equipment was entirely designed and developed in India. "NASA provided the satellite, but the Earth stations, electronics, and 10-foot chicken mesh antennas were all made here," he said. "It was like a set-top box, but for community viewing." Magic In The Eyes Of Children The social impact of SITE was profound. "Most villagers had then never seen a moving picture," Dr Karnik said. "Suddenly, here was this box that began to deliver images. It was magic. The children were so taken with it, their eyes lit up with wonder." This emotional connection drove the ISRO culture. "It gave us fulfilment and satisfaction. That's what motivated us," he said. The Visionaries Behind SITE Two names stand out in SITE's history: Professor Yashpal and Professor EV Chitnis. "Professor Yashpal was the director of the Space Applications Centre and truly a renaissance scientist," Dr Karnik said. "He brought in dramatists, artists, writers, creating a unique mix of technologists and creatives." Professor Chitnis, was Dr Vikram Sarabhai's right-hand man, he was the programme manager. "He was the mentor and guide to our young, impatient team," Dr Karnik said. "Even today, at 100, he remains mentally active and remembers everything." Kheda: Decentralisation In Action Alongside SITE, ISRO launched the Kheda Experiment in Gujarat, focusing on decentralised rural broadcasting. "We set up a small TV transmitter in a village and worked with cooperatives," Dr Karnik said. "Villagers began making their own programmes. It was participative communication at its best." Mr Kheda won UNESCO's prize and inspired the spread of low-powered TV transmitters across India. "At one time, Doordarshan was installing one a day," he said. From SITE To Discovery After SITE and the countrywide classroom programme, Karnik transitioned to Discovery India channel. "Discovery was focused only on documentaries-real-world entertainment," he said. "It was a challenge to prove that this genre could work in India." Dr Karnik succeeded. "At the end of five years, National Geographic came in as a competitor. That meant we had created a market," he said. India's Gift To The World "The US did a technology demonstration, but the scale and application were unique to India," Dr Karnik said. "Arthur C Clarke the famous science fiction writer then called it the greatest communication experiment in history. Maybe a bit of hyperbole, but there's truth behind it." SITE's legacy is undeniable. "It spurred the world to get direct-to-home television, starting from rural districts in India," Dr Karnik said. "We need to celebrate that." The ISRO Ethos SITE also shaped ISRO's philosophy. "Applications drove technology," Dr Karnik emphasised. "We didn't have satellites or rockets, so we borrowed them. But we built everything else ourselves." He hopes ISRO continues this ethos. "No vanity projects, no competition for its own sake," he said. "Just competing to see what you can do for the people in this country." This was ISRO's philosophy and a huge legacy inculcated by Dr Sarabhai. ISRO says Satellite Instructional Television Experiment (SITE), hailed as 'the largest sociological experiment in the world' during 1975-76. This experiment benefited around 200,000 people, covering 2400 villages of six states and transmitted development-oriented programmes using the American Technology Satellite (ATS-6). The credit of training 50,000 science teachers in primary schools in one year goes to SITE.' A Legacy That Lives On Today, millions of Indian homes rely on DTH television. Smartphones with satellite-to-phone connectivity are still on the horizon. But the roots of this revolution lie in a dusty villages in India, where a 10-foot dish and a battery-powered TV set brought the cosmos to the community. "SITE was the catalyst that made ISRO what it is today," Dr Karnik said. This broadcast is what bridged India's digital divide, way back in 1975, well before the Internet became omnipresent.
Time of India
28-07-2025
- Science
- Time of India
Unique space radar will track earth's every shake & shift
Built By Isro & Nasa, This Satellite Could Become Our Planet's Early Warning System For Floods, Crop Loss, Coastal Erosion Our planet is constantly changing. The ground shifts, often unnoticed. Glaciers inch forward, coastlines retreat and forests thin or thicken with the seasons. Some of these changes unfold slowly. Others strike without warning. On Wednesday, July 30, a satellite called Nisar (Nasa-Isro Synthetic Aperture Radar ), the first joint satellite mission for the two space agencies, will lift off to track these movements. It will scan the Earth's surface every 12 days, capturing changes as small as a few centimetres. Each pixel will represent an area roughly half the size of a tennis court. The data Nisar will gather will serve a variety of purposes — it will warn of flooding, coastline erosion, guide realtime disaster response, improve food security and even track ships. It will be one of the most advanced Earth-observation satellites ever to go up. by Taboola by Taboola Sponsored Links Sponsored Links Promoted Links Promoted Links You May Like Indonesia: Unsold Sofas Prices May Surprise You (Prices May Surprise You) Sofas | Search Ads Search Now Undo Beaming to villages Nisar's launch also comes 50 years after India and US collaborated on a very different kind of project: the Satellite Instructional Television Experiment, or SITE. Launched a month after then PM Indira Gandhi declared the Emergency, SITE began broadcasting on Aug 1, 1975 to community TV sets in 2,400 villages across Karnataka, Rajasthan, Odisha, Bihar, Madhya Pradesh and Andhra Pradesh. It was seen as a mutually beneficial deal for Nasa and Isro. At the time, 40% of India's population was in villages with fewer than 3,000 people, and a quarter were in hamlets with fewer than 200. Traditional infrastructure alone couldn't reach them, but space tech could. So, an agreement was made: The US would supply its ATS-6 telecommunications satellite for a test run; India would build the ground infrastructure. The experiment was a success. SITE reached around 2 lakh people, helped train 50,000 science teachers in primary schools and beamed advice to thousands of farmers, becoming 'the largest sociological experiment in the world'. Before SITE, India and US had worked together in space for close to a decade, but this was the first time their efforts touched lives. 50 years apart 'It took 50 years from one major joint project in communications and broadcasting to another project on Earth observation,' former Isro deputy director Arup Dasgupta, who led deployment of SITE's receivers, told TOI. He said Nisar's launch showed how much Isro had progressed. 'Fifty years ago, we used a Nasa satellite to beam educational programmes. Today, we are launching their payload along with our own Synthetic Aperture Radar on an Indian launcher.' Nisar has been described by Nasa-JPL project scientist Paul Rosen as 'a storyteller of Earth's changing surface'. The satellite will capture motion of land, ice, water and vegetation across seasons, which means data for seismologists, climatologists, agriculturists, conservationists and many others. And the information will be freely available to them. A dual-band instrument Equipped with dual radar systems — the L-band by Nasa and Sband by Isro — Nisar can see through clouds and observe Earth day or night. It will scan the Himalayas, beaches of California, the Amazon rainforest and the farms of Punjab — not just once, but repeatedly, creating a time series of surface changes that show what has shifted, where and how fast.'It lets us read Earth's surface like a series of moving frames,' Rosen said. 'Using SAR, we can measure ground displacement down to even millimetre precision.' The longer-wavelength L-band penetrates vegetation and interacts with features such as rocks and tree trunks. Shorter S-band captures surface details like leaves and topsoil. Combined, they allow scientists to view the same landscape through two different lenses, revealing structure and change. 'A dual-band SAR like this has never flown before. L-band opens up deeper imaging and new interferometric applications. You can track deformation, subsidence, and seismic shifts in much finer detail,' said professor PG Diwakar of the National Institute of Advanced Studies. One major focus will be the Himalayas. 'We've never had such a tool for studying Himalayan snow, glaciers and lake systems. Nisar will let us observe how glacial lakes evolve — critical for understanding GLOF (glacial lake outburst flood) risk,' Diwakar said. L-band's ability to see below the canopy also improves forest assessments. For farmers, it will help forecast yields and assess crop loss. In disaster-prone areas, Nisar's interferometric accuracy will boost early detection, measuring ground shifts over wide regions. It will even aid during oil spills. 'This will be the first mission between US and India to observe Earth in such a detailed way,' said Nicola Fox, associate administrator, Nasa science mission directorate. Roots in 1978 Nisar's roots go back to a breakthrough launch in 1978, when Nasa put in orbit Seasat — the world's first satellite with SAR. The mission lasted only 105 days, but the data this satellite produced reshaped Earth observation. Now, nearly 50 years after Seasat, Nisar is set to go up and stay there for at least three years, generating more data daily than any other previous remote-sensing satellite. For India, which will handle its launch, the satellite deepens its scientific engagement with the world. For Nasa, it extends an Earth observation legacy. Together, they have created something greater than the sum of their parts — a satellite that watches Earth not as a snapshot, but as a breathing, evolving whole.
Economic Times
24-07-2025
- Science
- Economic Times
50 years on, a pioneering ISRO project underlines tech's value in real-life use, not just in missions
Streaming from space Space has, once again, captured the imagination of people around the world. India, too, has seen a resurgence of interest in space, most recently through Shubhanshu Shukla's mission to International Space Station (ISS). However, the glamour and media coverage are mainly restricted to such missions, and are missing for programmes of technology it is the applications that justify the investments in space, especially for a developing country like India with so many alternative demands on resources. It is for this reason that India was a pioneer in the use of space tech for societal benefit. This year marks the 50th anniversary of a global milestone in this area. It was on August 1, 1975, that the Satellite Instructional Television Experiment (SITE) began, with its first broadcast. A collaborative India-US effort, SITE took educational and development TV programmes to specially installed community TV receivers in about 2,400 villages in six states. Programmes, beamed up to Nasa's ATS-6 satellite from Earth stations in Ahmedabad and Delhi, were received in these villages through a 10-ft diameter antenna and an electronic converter - a precursor to DTH (direct-to-home). The six states were selected keeping in mind India's diversity. And, within them, the most backward districts were chosen. The villages were often remote and included, in Orissa, unelectrified villages where TV sets were operated on batteries. TV sets, for community viewing, were installed in schools or panchayat ghars where all - irrespective of caste and class - had free access.A young team, led by a few stalwarts like SITE programme manager E V Chitnis - who turns 100 today - worked with passion and deep commitment. Engineers ensured that TV sets in remote villages were maintained so well that their downtime was lower than those in urban homes. Social scientists visited these villages - some lived there for 15 months - to research the impact. Programme-makers, almost all fresh graduates from Film and Television Institute (FTII), Pune, were recruited by Isro to make the science education programmes, while Doordarshan set up special studios to make programmes specifically for each state. Local language, area-specific broadcasts took the latest agricultural practices to farmers in SITE villages. Education programmes for primary school children aimed at the 'enrichment' of classroom teaching. A special teacher training programme - in person and supported by TV broadcasts - conducted in partnership with NCERT and the education ministry, covered 45,000 teachers in two sessions. Apart from state-specific broadcasts, a common 'national programme' for 30 mins each day was beamed to all six states. Concerned about the centralising potential of satellite broadcasting, SITE also included a decentralised set-up: India's first district-level rural TV station in Kheda district (the home of Amul), Gujarat. This served as the model for expansion of TV through low-power transmitters (LPTs). The Kheda Communications Project was an experiment in participatory communication and won wide acclaim, including Unesco's first Rural Communication Prize. Hailed by Arthur Clarke as 'the greatest communication experiment in history', SITE drew worldwide recognition. As the first-ever large-scale use of direct broadcasting from a satellite, SITE took TV into the depths of rural India, reaching disadvantaged people even before TV reached most urban areas. While it lacked the heart-stopping drama of a rocket launch, or the heart-in-mouth climax of the last tragic moments of Chandrayaan-2, it had many heart-warming awe, novelty and magic of seeing a moving picture come out of a box - most people in SITE villages had never been to a cinema - the excitement and spark in the eyes of children watching educational programmes: these moments will stay forever with those involved in SITE. Probably in the one year of SITE, we learned more than the villagers. SITE embodied Vikram Sarabhai's vision for Isro, which was based on two primary strands: knowledge creation, and its use for practical benefit. The former, encompassing space science, began with cosmic ray research, using balloons and sounding rockets, and progressed to the Mars mission, the successful Chandrayaan landing and the solar observatory, Aditya. Both strands were based on the philosophy of self-reliance where possible, and cooperation or collaboration where necessary. SITE exemplified this. All the ground hardware was designed, developed and made in India; the satellite and its launch were by the US. Today, India has moved many notches up with Nisar (Nasa-Isro Synthetic Aperture Radar) mission scheduled for launch on July paced and dictated technology development, the latter not being a goal in itself. To be the 'first' or 'fifth' country to do something was never an objective, and vanity projects were articulation of this - which one hopes continues to be Isro's north star - is best expressed in Sarabhai's words: '...there is no ambiguity of purpose. We do not have the fantasy of competing with the economically advanced nations in the exploration of the moon or the planets or manned space-flight. But... if we are to play a meaningful role nationally, and in the community of nations, we must be second to none in the application of advanced technologies to the real problems of man and society.' An apt reminder on SITE@ writer worked in Isro for over 2 decades, and was deeply involved in SITE (Disclaimer: The opinions expressed in this column are that of the writer. The facts and opinions expressed here do not reflect the views of Elevate your knowledge and leadership skills at a cost cheaper than your daily tea. Can victims of Jane Street scam be compensated by investor protection funds? Did the likes of TCS, Infosys, Wipro let India down in AI race? How India's oil arbitrage has hit the European sanctions wall Apple has a new Indian-American COO. What it needs might be a new CEO. Stock Radar: Tata Chemicals breaks out from 1-month consolidation; time to buy the dip? Power sector companies: Will they be able to outperform? 5 power stocks with an upside potential ranging from 6 to 29% For risk-takers with long-term perspective: 7 mid-cap stocks from different sectors with upside potential of over 26% Multibagger or IBC - Part 16: Regulatory tailwind turns compliance into cash. This auto ancillary could be a winner
