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Updated on: September 18, 2019, 8:46 AM IST

September 18, 2019, 8:46 AM IST FOLLOW US ON: Facebook Twitter Instagram

Prayagraj: A video doing the rounds on social media since Tuesday shows a man standing on a pillar of New Yamuna Bridge in Prayagraj. He climbed with the Indian flag and refused to get down unless ISRO manages to 'recover' the Vikram lander.

The man has been identified as Rajnikant. Although he claims to be a namesake of the Tamil superstar, his action-packed drama did not quite manage to achieve the impossible.


Vikram is still believed to be out there, somewhere on the lunar surface.

The man has been identified as a native of Manda in Prayagraj, Uttar Pradesh, according to an "indiatoday.in" report. He climbed up on Monday night.


It's been 11 days now that ISRO's prestigious moon mission went awry, when the space research organisation lost contact with Vikram lander of Chandrayaan 2 owing to a last-minute snag that developed after the operation went off smoothly all along.

On September 7, Vikram, while on its descent to soft land on the Moon's south polar region, apparently lost control and crash-landed there, snapping the communication links.


Hopes to salvage the lander-rover are fading with the window of opportunity to restore link with 'Vikram' closing in. A team at ISRO Telemetry, Tracking and Command Network here has been desperately trying to restore the link with the lander.

With the entire country supporting the space organisation, ISRO on Tuesday thanked Indians in the country and abroad for the support it received after the space agency lost contact with the lander.

"Thank you for standing by us. We will continue to keep going forward propelled by the hopes and dreams of Indians across the world!" ISRO said in a tweet.