S-band scam hasn’t harmed ISRO’s image: Former chief

NEW DELHI - The 2G spectrum band allocation scam has not really affected or pulled down the image of the country’s premier space research organisation, ISRO’s former chairman K. Kasturirangan said here Saturday.

“It is the performance that matters. The organisation has been performing consistently and the scam has not really affected our grit and determination to that level, Kasturirangan, chairman of the Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) for over nine years, told IANS.

The ISRO faced flak for its alleged involvement with a Bangalore-based company called Devas Multimedia Private Ltd which got the scarce S-band spectrum for 20 years for a pittance.

“ISRO has so many missions coming up, and all of them are expected to take us higher. One should not go by what is reported in certain circles, Kasturirangan said on the sidelines of the Honda awards for Young Engineers and Scientists (YES) in the capital.

The YES awards, presented to 14 students from the premier engineering institutes of the country– the Indian Institutes of Technology (IIT) — supports the young engineers on the basis of their technical papers, essays, cumulative grade point average (CGPA), followed by an interview.

The idea is to tap the enthusiastic response we get from the IIT students. India has a lot of young talent, and we feel proud to team up with a prestigious institute like IIT, said Tatsuya Natsume, director of marketing, Honda Siel cars limited.

The students get to visit Japan for a sponsored educational trip — mainly a summer training.