SRIHARIKOTA: India on Friday got a step closer to establishing indigenous alternative to United States-owned global positioning system or GPS by launching the second of the seven navigation satellites.Called the Indian Regional Navigation Satellite System-1B, the payload lifted successfully on PSLV-C24 rocket from Sriharikota at 5.14pm. Less than a minute later the satellite was in orbit.Once operational by 2016, the IRNSS system will offer navigational services for both and defence purposes in India and 1,500km beyond its borders.IRNSS-1B separated from the launch vehicle and was placed into a preliminary sub-geosynchronous transfer orbit, an elliptical orbit with an inclination of 19.2 degrees with respect to the equatorial plane.Soon, the master control facility (MCF) at Hassan took control of the satellite. It will perform initial orbit raising manoeuvres to reach a circular geosynchronous orbit with an inclination of 31 degrees."The launch was successful and met predefined targets," said Isro chairman K Radhakrishnan. Against the targeted perigee of (nearest distance from earth) of 284km, the satellite achieved 283km. As for the apogee (maximum distance from earth), it fell short of just 20km of the targeted 20,650 km, but well within the margin of plus-minus 675 km.This was the 26th flight of Indian space programme's workhorse PSLV, and the 25th consecutive success at that. It was also only the sixth time that PSLV was flown in 'XL' configuration which allows for higher payload to inject satellites into higher orbits. The XL version was earlier used for critical missions like Chandrayaan-1, Mars orbiter mission and the first IRNSS satellite IRNSS-1A on July 1, 2013. All the seven IRNSS satellites will have identical configuration and are built for a mission of 10 years."We will be launching two more satellites – IRNSS 1C and IRNSS 1D – this year. We will launch another three IRNSS satellites in the beginning of 2015. By mid of 2015 all the seven satellites will be in orbit," the Isro chairman said. Another launch of PSLV (C23) is planned this year to carry satellite Spot-7, along with four foreign satellites.Isro will launch a GSLV-Mark III in June this year with a 'novel payload' to as a prelude to manned missions. It is an experimental mission to test solid stage S200, liquid stage L110 and cryo stage. "A crew capsule will also be on board which will help us characterise atmospheric reentry conditions and give us data to validate our own life support systems," said a senior official of ISRO. The space organization will also send to space satellites Astrosat and Aditya aboard PSLVs. Aditya is designed to study sun and its features like coronal emissions.Isro officials said the Mars orbiter mission is performing satisfactorily. It has been covering 7 lakh km per day and the next trajectory correction is planned in June this year.