Our Man in Space... Showing the Way Beyond the Skies

N setting a record of being the first Indian to enter the International Space Station (ISS) on June 26, 2025, 39-year-old Group Captain Shubhanshu Shukla, addressed the nation for the first time from space, exclaiming "What a ride!" In his message intended for 1.4 crore Indians, he said: "This journey of mine is not a beginning to the International Space Station, but to India's Human Space Programme. I want all of you to be part of this journey. Your chest should swell with pride... Together, let's initiate India's Human Space Programme."

- NIRAD MUDUR

If Gp Capt Shukla is the first Indian to enter the ISS, he is also the first Indian to be a space mission pilot, that of the DragonX spacecraft of Axiom-4 (Ax-4) Space Mission, in which Shukla (call sign 'Shux') is part of a four-member team. The other three members are mission commander Peggy Whitson, a former NASA astronaut and director of human spaceflight at Axiom Space and two mission specialists, European Space Agency (ESA) project astronaut Sławosz Uznanski-Wisniewski of Poland and Tibor Kapu of Hungary.

Axiom-4 (Ax-4) Mission is a collaboration involving Axiom Space, the NASA, the ISRO, and the European Space Agency. The Ax-4 mission will also be remembered for enabling an Indian astronaut to return to space after 41 years, after the space mission of (then) Sqn Ldr Rakesh Sharma in April 1984.