Shubhanshu Shukla echoes Rakesh Sharma: 'India still looks most beautiful from space'

Indian astronaut and Indian Air Force Group Captain Shubhanshu Shukla has said that Indi continues to look more beautiful than the rest of the world from space, echoing the historic words of Rakesh Sharma, who made the same observation in 1984.

"Bharat aaj bhi Antariksh se saare jahaan se accha dikhta hai," Shukla said during a press conference in New Delhi on Thursday, August 21.

Also Read: “Historic moment for India”: PM Modi welcomes Astronaut Shubhanshu Shukla back to Earth

Shukla, who recently became the first Indian astronaut to travel to the International Space Station (ISS) as part of the Axiom-4 mission, served as the mission pilot during his nearly 20-day stay in orbit. He returned to India on Sunday, August 17, where he was received by Union Minister of State Jitendra Singh and Delhi Chief Minister Rekha Gupta.

On August 18, he met Prime Minister Narendra Modi to share mission outcomes and discuss the future of India's space exploration programmes.

Also Read: 'Earth looks completely one, no border exists': Shubhanshu Shukla's quote features in new NCERT book

Calling the mission “extremely successful,” Shukla emphasized the invaluable knowledge gained from human spaceflight. “We have been able to achieve all of our technical objectives. Execution of such a mission gives a lot of knowledge and information which are intangible, that cannot be measured or documented,” he said.

He added that the insights collected during the Axiom-4 mission would directly contribute to India’s upcoming human space programmes. “The benefit of executing a human space mission is more than the training. The supplementary knowledge we get just by being there is invaluable. All the information I have collected in the past year will be extremely useful to us for our own missions, Gaganyaan and Bharatiya Antariksh Station,” Shukla noted.