[00:00:00] Hi, you're listening to the new space, India podcast, a biweekly doc show that exclusively brings insights from the Indian space activities ecosystem. I'm your host nine, the co-founder of India's first space focused think tank spaceport. Guests on the new space in depth podcast, help you understand space activities related macro and micro trends within India in all aspects, including space.

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For space, [00:01:00] lunges and satellites.

Hello friends. Uh, my name is and I joined this role in the year 1970. Uh, as you know, you saw was formed in 1969. So I'm one of those very early recruits. I worked in Israel all the time, 34 years. And, uh, I worked in the same center of Israel, which is the space application center. Of course, when I joined this road, there was no space application center.

Uh, it was electronic systems division. And, uh, um, the project which I was selected for was the satellite instructional television experiment, uh, which was just about to take off the agreement with NASA had been signed sometime in, I think September 69. So I was one of the first few recruits [00:02:00] for the project.

Uh, I'm basically a city bread person, and even my parents were. Born and brought up in small towns. Uh, so I had no experience at all of the rural setting and it so happened that I happened to be selected for a project. And in fact, subsequent projects where all my work was in the rural areas. So as in the course of my work, Move to every nook and cranny of a country, uh, either on the site experiment work or later on in my work on remote sensing and geographic information systems.

So, um, There are many stories to tell, I guess, but, uh, maybe a few of them I can just recount and, uh, you know, the first one is of course, uh, my [00:03:00] travels within rural India. Maybe I should tell you a little story of how I went to a place called bold condom miles. Both corn miles is located in. And, uh, right now it is rather famous for its Naxalite connection, but in those days I'm talking of 1974.

Uh, things were not that bad. But then the question was how to reach there. So nobody would tell us how to reach that. So prostate fitness was at that time handling the side project, uh, handed me 5,000 rupees and said, rich, whichever way you want you walk, fly, swim, whatever, but you reach that. Now in those days was quite a lot because salary was about 700 rupees.

So, and there were no credit cards and things like that. So we just pocketed the 5,000 rupees and, uh, proceeded to, uh, [00:04:00] discuss in my colleagues out to reach them. We have four of us over a team, so we found we go by a train and get down at a small town called Yasso Gouda. And then from there we take.

Another trend or if you are in a hurry, take a taxi and then you reach a place called . And then from some Whirlpool you reach the, one of the carts on the banner delivered and both can mothers on the other side of the river. And I say, I'm Hannah, the river as the name implies is a huge river. It's almost like, you know, if you're standing on one bank, you can barely see the other bag.

So we had a car and then we went to the guard and then there was this a ferry. We were told that there's a ferry. So the ferry turned out to be a huge raft. Actually, we drove a car onto the raft and then we crossed the river. And then again, we'd started driving towards this town called bold completely.

It was a, uh, you know, [00:05:00] deserted area. We are going through a very sparse. Finally, we reached the town of bald and there, of course, we were met by the local office of the all India radio who had been alerted that we were coming and they were very happy to see us because apparently they felt also very isolated in that small town.

So we can, we, they took us around the town. You could circumnavigate that town within about a half an hour, and that was the size of the town. And then we said that, look, we are going to put up these TV sets and so forth for the rural population. And, uh, where are these located? So they gave a big laugh and they said there is no rural population yet.

This is a completely tribal area. And then you have these small pockets of cables with no electricity. So you can't run your TV sets over there. And, um, so if you're looking for putting the TV sets away, you better, uh, put it, uh, put battery operated sets. So [00:06:00] that's why it was one of my experiences in the depths of rural India, so to speak.

And then the, I remember, uh, when, uh, again and things 74, um, I had been because I was working in the rural context. So I was put in charge of something called the deployment operations and maintenance. You know, we had to deploy 2,400 direct reception sets in, uh, 2,400 villages. And these are pretty backwards.

Children's specifically. So, because they wanted to study the impact of a learning medium, like television on, uh, these kinds of populations. And, uh, so. At the Sackler we are going to use was a eight, six, uh, at that time at ESF, then as a way of doing things is to call it, uh, give it, uh, F alpha numbers, and then once you launch it, it will go numeric.

So it was application [00:07:00] technology, satellite F, which then became ATS six once it was launched. So it is six had been launched already. And, uh, it was, uh, stationed over the, uh, United States. And, uh, it was broad, it was being used to broadcast, uh, health education and, uh, technology programs in the U S as well as.

Now it would be actually for India's use, it will be actually shifted eastward and stationed somewhere over in east Africa, from where we could see the satellite I'm far from where the one of the NASA stations located in the UK could also see the satellite because the satellite had to be under their control.

So the problem was that we had the satellite only for a year. So that meant that, uh, The satellite will be given to us somewhere on August. And will be taken away by about 15th of August next year. So August 10th, 1975 to [00:08:00] August 15th, 1976. That was the period. And naturally, if you want to cover 2,400 villages in remote areas, you have.

Uh, it will have everything ready by the time the satellite comes. Okay. Now the problem was we have this, all this direct reception sets, antennas, TV sets, everything made, how do we test it? We tested in the lab. Everything is fine. How to test it with the real satellite. So the idea was that a team of us would go to NASA.

We were, well, we were to go to the Goddard space flight center in Washington, and we would set up our unit over there, uh, test it out with the live satellite. And once the test results were satisfactory, we could say that the project could immediately start. So 74, I think, around, um, July or August four of us, two of FAS, in fact, [00:09:00] three of us had already gone previously because they were in the last station business and that they had to, uh, they were already located in a place called Rozman, uh, where the main station for controlling the satellite was.

And we, uh, two of us, we followed with the rest of the equipment, which has two antennas and these Antoinette. 10 foot diameter dishes, which had been, uh, you know, uh, disassembled and packed in two chests, two huge packing cases, two TV receivers, and a few spares and things like that. So with all this, this was sent ahead of us and had reached Washington and had been collected by GSOC and kept in a warehouse.

Uh, we reached there and, uh, then, uh, we were supposed to do. Well, you know, open up the packages. And so the packages came very well. There was no damage at all, both the TV sets for perfectly. All right. Tested all. Okay. Uh, and then I had to be assembled. And, uh, so [00:10:00] there were five of us, two of us and three earlier people.

So we have. Uh, I don't know, eh, um, enacting the antenna. Other problem was that I know mounted on the ground and it was a tripod. So you had to dig for each Anthony, you had to dig three holes, two feet deep, puts the track transplant, uh, the, the tripod in, and then of course, fix it up and then Mount the reflector and then pointed the clicker.

So if I'm that the, uh, uh, and that's a host word in a bit of a, make a, how do we get big those holes? So, first of all, we had to get permission from the people to dig the holes that was done. That's not a problem. It was on the side of the building. And, uh, I don't remember the building number, but there were a lot of antennas there because a lot of this kind of work was going on.

So we had to, we are given a place for the hour to hours. So now the problem was how to dig the hole. So finally, one of us, I remember [00:11:00] he said, can we get a shovel? So it was a, what can I suggest to honor the shovel, you know, used to dig? So they said, yeah, we have one. That's what I'm saying. I have one in my garden.

So he brought the shovel and we got down to actually digging those walls. Those guys are very surprised. And then from then on, we are known as the mad Indians. So we dug those holes, put in the tripod, and then we had developed a method of pointing the antenna in a blind fashion because obviously back in India, there was no time to point out.

And we, after the satellite, so we had developed this method. So we use the method and pointed that. And low and behold, every other Atma was looking this way. I was always looking this way, my third wrong. We again, went through the whole scan. No, there's nothing wrong. Then suddenly those Jack Miller, he was actually the person who was handling the project from NASA.

He just [00:12:00] his head and said, come get me. So we went back into his cabin and then he did something on the computer. And then he handed me another set of, uh, uh, uh, um, you know, what do you call as a Morton elevation angles for the satellite, from that location as well? This time when we use it, we got perfect alignment later on.

I found that it's sort of giving us the azimuth angle and elevation angle of the satellite from that location. He had given us a sub satellite point of the satellite. So naturally we looked in the wrong place. So that was fine. And then of course, we had to test it with this ATLA, with the satellite and the satellite was pretty busy.

Everybody was using it. So we got the time at two o'clock in the morning. So we went back, we were staying in a small apartment. We went back and then at one 30, we called up the taxi service and we piled into the taxi, came to NASA and, uh, To the lab. [00:13:00] And, uh, two of the NASA engineers were also there. And, uh, the satellite, uh, was, uh, we were given permission to start receiving satellite, uh, signals.

And so we, we just switched on the system and those, this spectrum analyzer connected to the output. And then. You've got the, you got the signal. So that was one great thing. We didn't even have to adjust that. And although we did try, but this thing was fantastic spot on, but the problem that then we realized was that the signal that was coming was a 20 DB below what was expected and that was not good.

So what could we, the problem. So first, uh, they said that the, maybe the side we are not transmitting and they, I mean, they have to transmit, so they are not transplanting the full power. So they kept, uh, they pushed up the power. We a small increase in the blood, but nothing more. [00:14:00] So anyway, it was by that time three or four in the morning.

So we said, okay, well, let's, we'll think about it later. Why this is happening. And meanwhile, my boss from, uh, uh, sack this none other than promote colleagues, so promoted that he called me up and don't what's happening. So I said, yeah, we have set up landowners. We have set up everything yesterday. We tested with the, um, rather the satellite, we got the signal, but the problem is signal is coming to DDB.

He says, what kind of a helix are you using? This was, you know, uh, circularly polarized signal. So I said, this is, uh, we are given to our senses is a right circular polarization. He said, yes, he's right. Circle polarization from the satellite. So that's a global, regional satellite will look like a left global resident from your end.

So what is the helix they are using? So I said, okay, I'll get back in immediately checks [00:15:00] or third. And then it was also. Right circle polarized. So immediately he called up the antenna manufacturers, told them to halt all production, that antenna helix as to Vicente and Felix. So with that very first test, we could find out a problem.

And that saved us a huge amount of money because we are going to make something like 3000 antennas. We had made already about 200, but the rest of 2000. Uh, the feed was corrected. So that was one experience. And then of course, we went through a lot of testing and everything that was great fun went through with flying colors.

And then after the holding of the oil, very relaxed. And I think we're all having a cup of coffee and Jack Miller calls me to his office. When are you going back? I said, now I'm supposed to go back a couple of days. What does that? He's in? No, you, now you write a report. I [00:16:00] want to see a report of all the, what you have done.

All the difficulties you face. All the corrections are done only. Then I let you go. If required, you'll extend your state and I'll talk to Carla and. I had to sit back a step. We stay back and write the whole report. It's almost 200, 300 page report. But the interesting thing was that was a fantastic grounding for me, because then I realized that any work that you do, unless you complete documentation, it all gets lost.

And this is a lesson that I carry with me right through my. So this was one of those great things that happened. And, uh, then, uh, of course we came back to India and, uh, we started on site and then we had a lot of interesting experiences. One of the experiences that we had was, uh, you know, we had to do this kind of village selection.

How do, because, you know, we had to almost go to something like about 10,000 villages before you could select those [00:17:00] 2,400, which we would. So we take a lot of parameters distance from the road, whether it's motorable road, what is the population side? Because of the social analysis people wanted population size and male, female ratio number of children because they used to be children.

All this kind of data was being collected. And for us it was the approachability. And then the availability of electric power and the location we are where we want to put it. We selected the school in many places. We found a school building with a totally decrepitude and had to be repaired and things like that.

So this was going on and I think I was there in Bihar. And suddenly the person who is in charge will to be hard cluster. He was one cl Roy. So he called me and said, uh, he's only here. I was sitting there with the people. And then he said, sir, please come. So we all go, then others, no only you should come [00:18:00] with local fight.

So when then, then there was this guy contingent sitting there. They said, why is our village Nazi?

He said a whole village has this religious that no, it was really a very well developed village. So, and therefore it was not selected, right. Unfortunately, a neighboring village was elected, which was not so well developed. So how could you select that undeveloped village and not us? So our excuse was it's easily done by computer selection.

So. I don't believe in all this computer and all this stuff, you better select.

So I said, okay, we'll see, because it's not in my hands. This work is being done. And back in, I'm the one. So I was going to tell them all this thing, and I know that down the name of the village, et cetera. And is it okay? Fine. But if you don't, we'll go to that village, pick up all your TV and everything [00:19:00] and give it, bring it in our village.

This is the kind of situation with there on the ground. So this was one, yeah, that time, you know, the stem, the, uh, the installation work was going on. I had gone to check him out and then we went to one village and there was this farmer who was absolutely sitting tight on a small plot of land next to the school building.

And, uh, the people, uh, my team was actually putting a bank on the roof. Now this is a Gable roof, so you can put the antenna on the roof. So it hasn't been fixed on a pole on the wall. And then, then reflect recipe, which is not exactly what we would have liked, but we were doing that. So then I said, why are you doing this?

Why don't you put it on the ground? So he said, you see, do you see that man sitting there? I said, yeah, he's the owner of that. And for him, if I put the antenna there, he can't use the plot for one year, so [00:20:00] he's not going to allow us to put in there. So these are kind of for non-technical issues, which affect us in that technical ways.

Very interesting episode was relating to the maintenance. Now the rule was, this is completely modular set. So the rule was, if a problem is. You go to the village, you see what's the problem and pull out the offending module, put in a fresh muddy, check it. The TV is working and then. With the, uh, with the non-functional module.

And then they said to be sent to be a cluster headquarters as we called it. So like, you know, uh, in was the cluster headquarters. And then I just. Uh, Jaybird was the cluster at, in these headquarters, the ECI L because the TV sets were made by ECI. So ECI had stationed the [00:21:00] team and then they would receive the defective units to repair it.

And then I can put it back into circulation. I got a call from the , uh, in, um, He said that there's a huge problem. That was the problem with whatever I'm getting from the manga town. There are some multiple problems. How can, how can a single a guard have so many problems? So I said, okay, I'll try and find.

So, what I found was very interesting, this chaplain, the horse station and that Banga. Yeah. Obviously plenty of, plenty of time on his hands. And he was a bit of a electronics nut. So what he was doing was he would, he would use his multimedia. In fact, they had none, no other instruments except a multimeter.

He would use a multimeter and find out which are the devices, which are gone. He would pull them out. He would write. [00:22:00] Take the good devices from the spare card, put it there. And then what you will do was that bad device. You would, again, put back if this other guy, and he would go on doing this one card would have maybe four or five faulty devices, and then he would send it to.

So I think this is salt. So then we had to tell him that look, uh, I see, I mean the, maybe he's chap told him you're doing a great job. Only a one request. Two is please don't hold it the bad units back into the, leave them. So we know that this is what as the is. So, you know, you had this kind of interesting events also happening.

And after I finished in 75, we finished at 12 August. So site was over and I was at losing what to do, and then calls me or the director. So he called me and he says, What are you going to [00:23:00] do? You tell me when you go I'm right now, working on the next project has an, another project called satellite telecommunication experiments project.

And I was going to develop a voice activated transmission system. So as is what I'm doing, you like it? I says, okay. He says, no, I want to do something else. Uh, you go into the remote sensing area. No, I fell from the sky. I'm a communication engineer. What do I know of remote sensing and, uh, you know, I mean, high level science and so forth.

So it is all that is fine, but what we need is a connectivity to the. Do we, and if we need a person who can convey what was being done in remote sensing to the people on the ground, so that they appreciate what's happening and you have that experience because you've worked inside and in rural areas and so forth.

So by [00:24:00] don't do take it up. So that's how I got into remote sensing, not into any of the nitty gritty of remote sensing, but more in terms of acting as a communications channel between the science. We're working on the various applications and the people who are ultimately would be using those applications.

That's how we started. And, uh, there again, I remember one very interesting incident which happened is at that time, one of our, uh, the, one of the groups in, uh, remote sensing was actually working on land use mapping and they were using aerial photographs and they were, uh, doing this project. They were, did in several areas, but the nearest one they were doing was.

Was in a place called, uh Gadara. So, uh, we, uh, we went to visit, they were to visit the collector. They asked me to come have a look [00:25:00] at the things. So I said, fine, let's go. So we went to go there and, uh, there, we met with the district collector and, uh, Then, uh, we, this team was already explaining to him what has been done and so forth.

And they were making these nice tables, which shows that forever. District, you know, how much of area was under, what up and things like that. And this gentleman was saying, yes, he is. Yes. Uh, but you know, I would like to know where these are. I would like to know where these are and I go, and I found the team was not understanding that at all.

So then I intervened and I said, look, I think what he's really looking for this. He's not looking for statistics. And then this gentleman, he said, yes, yes. He asked me, he said, tell you all right. I want to map, if you say that there's a particular area or under the, let's say the ground, not crop. I want to know where is it?

I, the statistics I always get, what, where is that? Which other fields which are having this particular crop, that is what I want. [00:26:00] So actually with just that one intervention, we shifted the whole activity from statistics to more of mapping and thematic mapping, uh, find interesting things there. Once we had got to gala, uh, we wanted to do a project for the EDT, uh, uh, uh, area.

So we have the forest officer with us, the chief, which you've come to Metro forest. And we had the, I think the chief salsa officer and we were two of us, but they assigned myself and we went all the way to. Uh, up and down, you know, there's somebody called main central road, right? So we blocked the main central road and roll all the way from random, right up to ADG.

And backend was a really wonderful, it was supposed to be a field trip. So we collected a lot of information, but other than that, it was a great day when we [00:27:00] went to take a D and we could see the elephants and things like that. So that was the bonus kind of thing for the work that we did. Ah, then of course, that went through very nicely.

And, um, um, what else do we do is then when I looked at this whole issue of the mapping, then I realized that, uh, remote sensing gives us, gives us maps. Fine. People are also very happy with those maps fight, but the problem is how do they use those maps? Okay. So now I've found that know, for example, if you want to interpret those same imagery, the first thing that you need is a ground group.

And for ground rules, what these people will do is they would take the imagery, mark the area, which they had a dope and actually go to the field, collect that information and then finalize their thematic details. So I said that why don't we look at this, something, [00:28:00] which is. Not all of this work was being done.

Analog. Why don't we look at digital maps and we look at, uh, how to, uh, you know, organize all the other data in a digital environment as well. I started reading up on GIS and so forth, and I had two colleagues with me at that time. So they were also doing a lot of reading. And then I persuaded, uh, my, uh, boss at that PD browser.

So I persuaded him. Why don't we get a GIS and start working on it on an experimental basis? And he said, yeah, go ahead. And, uh, so we started looking out, which are the one, and then finally, uh, one of my colleagues studied the whole thing and said, sir, let's go for. R an Arkin for how to get art info. Now, here is a serendipity works.[00:29:00]

I was going to Calcutta on some work and in those days you never direct flight. So you had to go to Bombay and stay overnight. And then morning you catch a flight to Calcutta. And, uh, sitting next to me was the chap whom I had worked with long time ago. And he was actually from IBM. And at that time, IBM had been driven out.

This is, this is roughly I'm telling around 77 and so forth. So IBM had been pushed out of India and a lot of the IBM staff, uh, had actually formed to come together and form down the company and the core IDM national data. And this guy was working with that company. And we had, we had been working on buying some desktop computers.

So I just met him and we got to chatting. And then he said, then I said, you, he asked me, what are you doing? I said, I was kind of looking at these kinds of GIS kind of things. Then he said, that's interesting because we are doing. So I fell from the sky. I said, great, well, what are [00:30:00] you doing? He says, no, no, we are working in the Santa Cruz export promotion zone.

And we are doing a lot of, uh, disliked digitization work for offshore clients. And we are using arcane for. So I said, can we go and have a look at it? He said, I don't know, because it's a export-oriented zone. So visitors are not allowed, but I'll see what I can do. So let me get back and then get back to you.

So find me part in, uh, And then he called me and said, yes, we can. So, but they should come absolutely clean. And they will go out absolutely clean. You're not even allowed to take out a potato, bring in or take out a piece of paper. So finally that ties again, two of my colleagues, they went off to Bombay and they had, and they came back with stars in their eyes.

They said, this is what we need. So I said, how do I, it, so again, I called Jack and said, look, you guys go to market this in India. He said, frankly, I don't think there's a market in India. I said, look, [00:31:00] at least you have one customer. So I do to market this. So he said, yeah, let me see. So he put in that would mean that they see people in Redlands, California.

So we was, uh, we were gone. We were kind of, you know, uh, um, there was no email and things like that at that time. So we use all by letter. So they sent a person, he came down and he discussed with us and he said, yeah, yes, what work you want to do? You can use arcane for, uh, but then now, you know, we, you have to have a data general machine.

I said, we don't use it a general use wax. So he said, I'll go back and look. So he went back and then he wrote back to me saying that, yeah, we can install it in a vaccine as well as it fine. So how to place the order. And in those days, mind do the department of electronics kind of thing. So anything [00:32:00] related to computer software and so forth, you had to capitalize it to them.

So we're just going to word that when suddenly this chap again, telephones me. And he says, Mr. , there is news for you. What is that? Then we are being taken over by a company called Hindustan computers. Uh, but they are also taking over the arcane for business and then most likely going to. Market can do good news.

So immediately again, I knew a lot of people in NCL, right? Because we had bought computers from them and we were working with them on an image processing system as well. So again, I called up my context in a seal and said, this is, this is going to happen. So he said, I don't know, I was eating. But then he came back to me and said, yes, this is what happened, but it seal is not buying it.

It's, it's being a bottle. It's being, uh, a partnership is being built up between a three and a sister company of seal called nit. [00:33:00] And essentially that's an educational kind of thing. So I said, I don't care who I want to buy it. And, uh, so then again, this whole thing started and then finally we, by that time, of course, the rest of the people in Israel also were very keen.

They said, we want that. We want it. So I said, okay, let's let's then buy in bunk. Right? So we bought, I think something like 10, 15 licenses, I think three, three or four licenses inside. Uh, C4 in an RSA. And then we had these regional remote sensing service centers. So five of them. So each of them, again, we give three, four, so 5, 6, 7, 7, almost 2025 licenses.

And that's how we got into GIS. And then of course we started, uh, putting together a lot of, uh, stuff on the, on the GIS. And then that is a timeout somewhere on 1983. This whole, uh, idea of a national natural resources [00:34:00] management system got muted and , at that time he was secretary DST. So they motored this idea.

Let's let get together and do something here. Then I was. But grouping for something called the natural resources information system and arise. And, uh, DSD was doing an NRD. M is natural resources, data management system. Of course they were going totally indigenous. So they were starting with the development of the GIS itself.

Uh CSRE in Bombay. Uh, when, uh, ladies I forget her name, uh, she was pushing that sole David that will leave when they are in for who and. We started off a pilot project. We got together the staff and we just made, and then of course the whole idea was to then put all, all, all over India, but then somehow or other it got stopped.

I don't know why, what happened, some [00:35:00] thinking in headquarters, maybe. So. I felt really dejected and as it will get this it, so on my file, I wrote an ISR IP and put it in my bottom door, but then suddenly again, it got revived. Uh, well, it was one of the person who was working with me here by then. He had been transferred to headquarters.

So he again started pushing this and then for the whole thing on Revit, And then we went in for a large project, uh, almost all India project recovered each and every state we involved the state remote-sensing centers and that's all the NRS project got done. And today, uh, much of the work that we did is now, uh, available on a system called.

Okay. Yeah. Which was basically started with the business. We had created in an RAs and of course the no added a lot of stuff. So you won't recognize the NRSS, but in that as well, the [00:36:00] starting point so to speak. And then of course, so we got involved in the. Um, one of the things that I would like to talk about in a solution also talked about the impact of sanctions, right?

So when we started the Enactus project at that time, we were, uh, basically we are we're in the workstation mode. So we were using Silicon graphics and, uh, uh, SEO software, of course. And, uh, the sanctions, it does.

In fact, uh, the source for the pilot, right. And after the pilot, we decided to go for the, uh, for the PC-based stuff, because as we also had, then by then shifted from the workstation, then minis to PCs. But I had gone to, uh, their user conference in, uh, 2008. [00:37:00] 4 99 now because they give us an award for, uh, innovative use of GIS.

They're asking for GIS for NA for information system development purposes. And I was supposed to go and collect the award. So there I met a lot of the people I knew and, uh, there was one person there. Um, he's written a book called. Anyway. So, uh, he, uh, I, since I knew him from before, so I started chatting with him and he said, and he said, you attend my lecture.

I said, fine. So that lecture, he shred that entire load shifting over to windows, MP. So that was news to me. So afterwards I went in as Goliath and I told him, what is this? So that's why I told you to it. In my lecture, we are leaving a workshop workstations. We are leaving mainframes. They are leaving minis.

We are going to work on. Windows [00:38:00] NT. So I came back and then that is the Raymond. We are discussing Modi. Uh, NRIs being, uh, you know, scaled up to an all India level. And, uh, so I said, look, uh, we just have to change the entire track because no, it's all PCs. In a sense. That was very good because you know, workstation on the pretty expensive and difficult is that I was facing was how are able to buy Sony workstation.

So once it became a PC based thing, it was, of course those species are pretty every PCs. So they're not all that cheap, but nevertheless, it was an order of magnitude cheaper. So my budget could be much better. And then of course we will buy huge amount of licenses so they could negotiate with this need to breed.

We'll bring down the cost. It was bogged down in figures, which I was told. Please don't do anybody stuff as very, they really came down and this is when the sanctions hit [00:39:00] and she said, we can't sell, we can't sell to you for, to do so then they'll buy media was fine. That we would place an order, but on behalf of the end users and SD will deliver to the end users, but we would act as kind of, you know, validators and things like that.

So using that. We were able to finally get the systems and get the project going, but there was another sad story. We were working on Silicon graphics. And by that time, uh, of course, once we went into NRIs at that time, uh, because I was also at that time heading the image processing group. So a lot of heavy, uh, processing work was there.

And again, there was a demand for a lot of, uh, workstations, powerful workstations, and again, we select certain. Suddenly, I get a call from Silicon graphics, man in India. [00:40:00] And he said, um, please hear me out. I said, what's happened. He said that, uh, there has been a, a problem with the us and, uh, they are suspecting the, all the workstations you have purchased are being used.

Um, purposes, we'll a skies. I said, look, I mean, we are, you know, that, you know, we are civilians and we work out in general, sensing satellites are not used by the military. And we are only doing the data processing part of it. So he said, no, but I left. So he came over and then he said, what had happened? See, this was a really silly thing.

So whenever we had to order any of these things, we had to actually give a justification, right? No, our friends into Andrew, they also wanted the [00:41:00] same workstation. So their purchase department got in touch with the operations department, the how to do get this because it was refused to them and our purchase, the chap, he just took a copy of my justification, any positive onto them.

You could have told them that you're not, don't just blind. Copy this guy. What they did was he blind copied it. And now this guy in the U S a belt, same workstation from two centers, and it brings the two together and he sees it justification the same. So you're more than trouble. So this finally, uh, they said, I'll bring, we'll bring that person you explained to him.

So the guy came and we is really feeling very this thing. So I said, yeah, what is it that you want? Do I want to see your machine? [00:42:00] I don't know. I kind of allow you to enter my level, unless I know why the rule is, if it's a foreigner and the partner wants to be, there has to be taken, you have to get permission.

So you can't enter my lap, but letting me, what is the problem? He said, you're using it for military purposes. I have to take my word for it. We are a civilian organization. We are, we are using, we used your system for, uh, an NRS kind of work. I showed him some of the stuff that we had done. And then right now we are using for data processing for our Iris that lakes.

So there's no military use. There is a civilian satellite, it was very difficult to connect. And, uh, this Indian, he was absolutely chivalry. And, uh, he took me aside and said, please do something and let him I'll look at it. Otherwise, my job with that stick, I said, okay. So then I called up [00:43:00] my director. I said, this is what had happened.

And what do you want me to do? You said that, okay. You have it. Accompanied by some somebody all the time and he should not take anything, no notes, no recording, nothing. So I said, okay, fine with this conditions. I said, okay, you come, I'll take you, but you will go only to that machine. You will see what is there.

It will be shown to you by the people concerned, and you're going to come back and I'll be you every step of the way. So he did that. He satisfied himself that there was nothing there, but it meant nothing because we were under, uh, uh, sanctions, uh, that never got lifted. And one of the things that came out of that was very interesting.

We were also at that time, uh, going to be [00:44:00] working on the data processing system for the, uh, radar SAR satellites, and we were in agreement and we were in agreement with the VLR DLR now, uh, for the use of their ERs data. So in RC was actually developing the system for reception of the. And we were to develop the data processing part and, uh, we needed a hype high-performance computer, but again, high-performance computers were not allowed.

We came to know from, uh, come from C deck was pointing that they were, uh, while working on a high-performance computer. One marker was there at that time. So we talked on the phone and he said, yeah, we have, we can, we can work together. I said, fight. So they were using something called a transporter transport rate, basically a computer processor with four communication ports.

So you could link them in any way into a [00:45:00] mesh stacked ladder, whatever, and, you know, you would then do parallel processing. So we worked on that and, uh, we were able to develop a pilot process. For me, SAR data data. In fact, Casey, that got an award for that, because that will consider to be the most innovative use of the transport.

The system used to call it, and then we had to buy one from them. And that was located in RSC for the ERs data processing. So in a sense, What happened was that the sanctions also helped us to do find a lot of other ways of getting the same job done. And in the end, I don't think the sanctions helped the us very much.

In fact, they actually harmed them because you remember there was another famous, uh, Uh, high-performance computing, a computer company forgotten the name. Now they had a computer in, uh, the national center for medium have weather forecasting in Delhi, Noida. [00:46:00] And I believe there was a chap sitting there at the gate from the India, from the us embassy.

And he would check each and every piece of paper that was going in or coming out to ensure that there was no other work being done except for, uh, metrological, uh, modeling. And, uh, this company then went belly up because what happened was they had set apart quite a few computers for sale to countries like India, where those under sanctions, but they could never make the sales because by that time, and they had more far ahead on the hyper horns.

So these are some of the memories that I had have. Uh, we did a lot of work with a lot of other agencies, DST. For example, we were participants in the national spatial data infrastructure, or some are other that never really took off the way it should have. We still. Rolling along. Uh, now I think I will.

The new [00:47:00] geospatial polishes com things are going to be very different. We always face a lot of problem with the new year swishy policy. We D all geospatial policy restrictions on aerial photography restrictions on satellite data. You know, you could, uh, even while our five meter data was under a, you know, we couldn't share with anybody and, uh, So I believe that now these things are going to change after many, many, many years will change, I guess, maybe in my lifetime, I hope.

Okay. So that's all I have to say.

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