Up next :

* A heavy foreign spacecraft to be bought to bridge transponder shortage

* Space Docking Experiment Mission to dock two small satellites in space

* Xposat, a small satellite to study cosmic X-ray sources

* Entry into untried, advanced Ka band with GSAT-20 spacecraft

The national space programme has got an allocation increase of around 1.6 per cent (Rs. 121 crore) and almost no new major spark of activity or infrastructure on the horizon.

This is at a time the space agency says it is trying to quicken the pace of making its spacecraft, launchers and also move up the launch vehicle technology.

The total outlay for 2016-17 is Rs. 7509 crore versus last year's Rs. 7388 crore.

The proposed Plan outlay of Rs. 6000 crore is the same as what the Department of Space - which forms the country's strategic troika along with Atomic Energy and Defence R&D - received in the last Budget.

Recently the chairman of the visiting Parliamentary Standing Committee on Space, Defence and other areas had said he would recomment 50 per cent higher outlay for DoS but reality has been far from it.

All the increase, again this time, is in the Non-Plan part, which has gone up from Rs 1388 crore last year to Rs. 1509 crore this year (or a rise of 8.7 per cent.)

Unlike the previous years, Budget documents do not tell what has been set aside for the individual projects related to future spacecraft for communication and Earth observation, launchers or new facilities planned at various centres.

Unused amount

Revised estimates for 2015-16 show that the Department could not spend Rs. 429 crore of the total outlay. (It was a much higher Rs. 1412 crore last time.)

Among the major centres, compared to 2015-16 ISRO Satellite Centre gets 145 per cent jump in outlay with Rs. 948 crore. Lead centre for launch vehicle development Vikram Sarabhai Space Centre gets 78 per cent higher allocation at around Rs. 1835 crore. Satish Dhawan Space Centre 20 per cent increase at around Rs. 843 crore. And payload developer Space Applications Centre 28 per cent more or around Rs. 578 crore.