Assam to Have India’s 1st Space Junk Monitoring Radar Under ISRO’s Project Netra

Assam is set to host India’s first space debris monitoring radar under ISRO’s Project Netra. The radar will be established in Chandrapur, near Guwahati, and will be capable of detecting objects as small as 10 cm within a range of 2,000 km. This initiative is part of ISRO’s broader effort to enhance space situational awareness and safeguard India’s growing satellite assets.

The project is expected to be completed within a year and represents an investment of approximately ₹1,000 crore. The state government has allotted 200 bighas of land for the facility and assured. Once operational, it will significantly reduce India’s dependence on foreign sources for tracking space.

This news comes within a month after Assam's state government has announced that it is gearing up to launch its own satellite system, ASSAMSAT, with technical assistance from ISRO.

India has been making significant strides in space debris monitoring and mitigation, but it still lags behind some of the more established spacefaring nations in terms of infrastructure and investment.

It was in April 2022, when ISRO announced that it aims to attain self-reliance in safeguarding the valuable space assets, ISRO will establish Space Surveillance and Tracking network with RADARS and Optical Telescopes under the project Network for Space Objects Tracking and Analysis (NETRA).

Project Netra is India’s initiative for space situational awareness (SSA), which includes radar and optical telescopes to track debris.

India aims to eliminate debris from all its space missions by 2030, setting a global precedent.

India has Space Situational Awareness Control Centre, which was established in 2020 to serve as India’s hub for monitoring space traffic.