From trails to telescopes: Gen Z swaps trekking for stargazing

IF MILLENNIALS FAVOURED treks and outings to nearby parks or wildlife sanctuaries on weekends, Gen Z prefers reaching for the stars — at star parties.

- ANJALI MARAR

More and more people across India are taking a shine to sleeping under the night sky at remote locations in order to spot stars and planets, and to capture galaxies with their cameras.

Though celestial objects have fascinated mankind for ages, stargazing with sophisticated telescopes and cameras has, of late, become more popular across the country, with multiple astronomy clubs and institutes involved in the subject research. Then there are star buffs who travel across India and, at times, overseas to get a glimpse of eclipses and rare celestial events.

Ladakh and the higher reaches of Uttarakhand possess some of India's darkest skies (least light polluted), which allow the naked eye to see our own galaxy, the Milky Way, besides a host of planets, double stars, galaxies, nebulae, constellations and meteor showers.

Planets like Mercury, Venus, Mars, Jupiter and Saturn can also be seen via telescope at remote locations in Himachal Pradesh's Chandra Taal, Uttarakhand's Spiti Valley, Bhandara near Nashik, and Panshet, Tamhini Ghat, Velhe, Mulshi and Naneghat areas in Pune district.

Successful space missions by the Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) in recent times, too, have stoked interest in the sky, space and astronomy, says Aniruddh Deshpande, the vice president of Pune-based Jyotirvidya Parisanstha (JVP).