New Delhi, Feb 8 : The Indian space programme touched several new highs in the past 5 years, and the achievements were made with substantial contribution from domestic industries, the Parliament was told on Thursday.

The key achievements include "commercial launches of LVM3 & PSLV, development of SSLV, earth observation satellites, navigation satellite, soft landing & roving on the Moon, mission to study the Sun (Aditya-L1) and major strides towards demonstration of human space flight", Union Science and Technology Minister Jitendra Singh told the Rajya Sabha in a written reply to a question.

He said that the government has taken several steps to encourage the startups to boost India's space programme.

This has increased the total number of registered start-ups on Digital Platform to 189.

He also lauded the Indian Space Policy 2023 and various schemes to encourage and hand hold private sector that were implemented by IN-SPACe.

This includes seed fund scheme, pricing support policy, mentorship support, design lab for NGEs, skill development in space sector, ISRO facility utilisation support, technology transfer to NGEs, among others.

"IN-SPACe has signed around 51 MoUs with Non-Government Entities (NGEs) to provide necessary support for realisation of space systems and applications envisaged by such NGEs, which is expected to increase the industry participation in manufacturing of launch vehicles and satellites," the minister said.

He also noted that ISRO currently "has no plans for Deep Space Probes", but conceptualisation studies are underway for human spaceflight programme, and further follow-up missions to moon and the Bhartiya Antariksh Station.

Singh also highlighted major outcomes of the Make in India initiative like domestic manufacturing of space hardware; space system and satellite manufacturing facilities established by Indian NGEs; and launch vehicles systems realisation facilitie by NGEs.

"The "Make in India" initiative in space technology is a strategic approach to boost domestic manufacturing, innovation, and self-reliance in the space sector," the Minister said.

/IANS