India is gearing up for a major milestone in its human spaceflight journey as the Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) prepares to launch the first uncrewed test mission of its Gaganyaan program, designated G1, in December 2025. The mission represents a critical step toward India’s goal of sending astronauts into space by 2027.
The Gaganyaan program, India’s ambitious human spaceflight initiative, seeks to demonstrate the nation’s capability to safely carry humans to low Earth orbit and return them safely.
Group Captain Shubhanshu Shukla reportedly said that India is ready.
ISRO Chairman V Narayanan said, as per ANI, "In the last 10 years, the progress has been phenomenal and exponential. The missions completed from 2015 to 2025 are almost double those from 2005 to 2015. During the last 6 months, three important missions have been accomplished. The Axiom-4 mission is a prestigious mission. The first Indian was taken to the International Space Station and was brought back safely, Shubhanshu Shukla..."
'Very Soon India Will Send Someone From Our Rocket, Soil'
Group Captain Shubhanshu Shukla said that the benefit of executing a human space mission went beyond training, as the supplementary knowledge gained simply by being there was invaluable. He mentioned that all the information he had collected over the past year would prove extremely useful for India’s own missions, Gaganyaan and the Bharatiya Antariksh Station.
He added that very soon, India would be able to send someone into space from its own capsule, rocket, and soil. Explaining the difference between space and ground training, he noted that the body went through many changes in space and, after spending 20 days there, it even forgot how to live in gravity.