Saturday, January 7 2006 15:25 Hrs (IST) - World Time -

Chandigarh: India's moon mission might be ready for take-off by 2008, according to renowned space scientist K Kasturirangan.

"The 21st century is going to be an era of planetary explorations and the country's moon mission may be ready by 2008," the Director of the National Institute of Advanced Studies at Bangalore and Rajya Sabha MP, formerly ISRO Chairman, said.

He said preparations for the unmanned mission were on.

Asked if ISRO was planning to send a manned mission to moon, he said, "As far as I know, as of now, they have no such plans."

Referring to a scientific meet he attended in Seattle in the US last year, he said it was underlined that if there is international space cooperation among nations, by second or third quarter of this century, we should be able to have colonies on moon."

"There could be lunar bases or settlements...India should play an important role in this," he said adding that the human spirit has been one of adventure and exploration.

Kasturirangan underlined that India should demonstrate its capability to work in cooperation with other countries on such missions.

Asked about President A P J Abdul Kalam's call for making India a developed nation by 2020, he said while a robust economic growth of around 8.5 per cent to 9 per cent would help take this vision forward, a holistic approach on various other fronts too would have to be adopted.