India to fund launch of satellite built by high school students of Nepal

India will fund the launch of an indigenous satellite built by high school students of Nepal. Ahead of Foreign Secretary Vikram Misri’s visit to Kathmandu, the Ministry of External Affairs (MEA) has signed a Memorandum of Understanding with the NewSpace India Limited (NSIL), a parastatal under the Department of Space, for grant assistance from the Government of India for the launch of Munal, a satellite developed by nine high school students in Nepal.

Misri will reach Kathmandu on Sunday for a two-day visit to Nepal – the first from New Delhi after the change of regime in the neighbouring country, according to the MEA.

Nepali space start-up Antarikchya Pratisthan Nepal (APN) in collaboration with the Nepal Academy of Science and Technology (NAST) mentored nine high school students to design and develop Munal, a 1U CubeSat measuring 113.5 mm X 100 mm X 100 mm with an approximate mass of 1.09 kg. The satellite will create a vegetation density database of the surface of the Earth.

The Munal consists of four missions, with three of them being science missions, including a Multi-Spectral Imaging Mission (CAM Mission), a Passive Attitude Control and Determination Mission (PACDS Mission), and a Satellite SSoC Payload Demonstration Mission (SPDM Mission). The satellite also carries a symbolic Art Mission to represent the art, culture, and history of Nepal.

The NSIL of India and the NAST of Nepal inked a launch service agreement for the launch of Munal in January when External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar visited Kathmandu, stated the MEA.

The MoU signed in New Delhi on Saturday provides for the MEA of the Government of India to fund the launch of the satellite by the NSIL.

The satellite is expected to be launched soon on NSIL’s Polar Satellite Launch Vehicle.

Misri is expected to have a meeting with Sewa Lamsal, his counterpart in the Government of Nepal, after reaching Kathmandu on Sunday. He will call on President Ramchandra Paudel, Prime Minister K P Sharma Oli, and Foreign Minister Arzu Rana before returning to New Delhi on Monday.

This is the second foreign visit by Misri, who took over as the foreign secretary last month. He had earlier visited Bhutan.

Oli had taken oath as the prime minister on July 15, leading a new alliance of four parties, including his CPN (UML), Nepali Congress, Janata Samajwadi Party, and Loktantrik Samajwadi Party. He and Nepali Congress chief Sher Bahadur Deuba clinched a deal that led to the ouster of his predecessor Pushpa Kamal Dahal, the chairman of the Communist Party of Nepal (Maoist), from the office of the prime minister.