UK hails India's Chandrayaan launch

LONDON: Britain has hailed India's successful launch of Chandrayaan, the first Moon Mission, as a sign of growing technological prowess of the country.

"Bravo, we are delighted to see it (the successful launch of India's first mission to the Moon)," Lord Malloch Brown, Foreign and Commonwealth Office minister in charge of Africa, Asia and UN said.

"India has now joined the 1000 mile high Club and it is the demonstration of India's growing technological prowess," Lord Brown, who paid a two-day visit to India last week, said.

The unmanned Chandrayaan I spacecraft blasted off smoothly from Sriharikota launch paid in Andhra Pradesh yesterday to embark on a two-year mission of exploration.

The robotic probe will orbit the Moon, compiling a 3-D atlas of the lunar surface and mapping the distribution of elements and minerals.

Terming his two-day visit to New Delhi on Oct 16 and 17 as "fruitful", Lord Brown said he held discussions on issues of bilateral, regional and international importance.

On the conflict between India and Pakistan over the Indus water treaty, he said the National Security Advisers of India and Pakistan had met over the issue and New Delhi had told Islamabad that it had not withheld water.

"India told Pakistan that there was no intention to withhold water and water level itself is low," Brown said.

On the question of Kashmir, he said "India was pleased by the recent statement of Pakistan President Asif Ali Zardari and it is waiting to see whether the assurances were carried through."

Terming it a "tragedy for the people of Kashmir", Brown hoped that the two "parties are going to sort it out."
The official, who had also visited Bangladesh, said he had come back "rather confident," with preparations for the electoral rolls done in a fair and appropriate way.

He, however, said it would be better if the election was held without the state of emergency.

Asked about difficulties faced by Bangladeshi hoteliers in the UK in getting semi-skilled hotel workers from the country, Brown said, "We are determined to find a way out. The door is not closed for Bangladeshi curry cooks but they have to come under the Point-based system."

He also said Keith Vaz, MP, chairman of the Home Affairs Committee who had recently visited India and Bangladesh had taken up the issue and trying to find a way out.