BJP leader Nalin Kohli on Tuesday slammed Congress party for crediting India's lunar mission Chandrayaan-3 to the country's first Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru, news agency PTI reported. Speaking with PTI, Kohli stated: "If the Congress party would like to give the credit of Chandrayaan in 2023 to Pandit Jawaharlal Nehru, who was in 1960s, I can only say this is a party which is stuck in the past."
"We hope that the Chandrayaan mission is successful. So far, it has been by clockwork. I think we should give due credit to our scientist, space organisation, and the government which has stood behind them and made it available what they needed for it to come sofar. Now we hope that landing on the Moon, that too on the south pole where no country has gone, to go smoothly. So, India can be part of history because actually very few countries have landed anything on the moon. India is among those handful attempting it, and hoping to make it possible," he further stated.
Previously, the Congress party praised the country's first Prime Minister, Jawaharlal Nehru, for his "visionary move" in establishing the space research centre.
"The ISRO dreamt of by Pandit Nehru, nurtured by Indira Gandhi ji, and taken to great heights by Rajiv Gandhi ji and Dr. Manmohan Singh ji achieves a new milestone! A proud moment for all, as we excitedly watch the Chandrayan3 take off to conquer the moon," Congress leader K C Venugopal posted on X (formerly known as Twitter).
Congress President Mallikarjun Kharge discussed the lunar expeditions, stating that they began in 2008. The Congress-led United Progressive Alliance (UPA) administration of Prime Minister Manmohan Singh was in power at the time.
Kharge also quoted India's first Prime Minister, Pt Jawaharlal Nehru: "I am convinced that the methods and approach of science have revolutionized human life more than anything else in the long course of history, and have opened doors and avenues of further and even more radical change, leading up to the very portals of what has long been considered the unknown."
He mentioned that India's lunar missions began in 2008 with Chandrayaan-1, which established the presence of water molecules on the moon. Our country accomplished a historic accomplishment, he added.
He said that Chandrayaan-2 used remote sensing to discover the presence of chromium, manganese, and sodium for the first time. Our experts' perseverance was not in vain.
According to Kharge, Chandrayaan-3 is a testament to all of our prior prime leaders, including Nehru, Lal Bahadur Shastri, Indira Gandhi, P V Narasimha Rao, Rajiv Gandhi, Atal Bihari Vajpayee, and Manmohan Singh's vision, foresight, commitment, and accomplishment.