Like Nasa’s Swati Mohan, India’s women scientists are breaking barriers in space exploration
- The 38-year-old Mohan marked a personal and professional high when she landed the Perseverance rover on Mars
- She is among a group of Indian women who have found successful careers in space science, including Tessy Thomas, Ritu Karidhal Srivastava and Muthayya Vanitha
When Nasa scientist Swati Mohan confirmed the touchdown of the Perseverance rover on Mars and said it was “ready to begin seeking the signs of past life”, the mission control centre in Pasadena, California, erupted in joy and high fives.
A video of that moment on February 18 has since gone viral, and congratulations have continued to pour in for the bindi-sporting Indian-American aerospace engineer, the head of guidance, navigation and control operations at the Nasa Jet Propulsion Laboratory who skilfully landed the spacecraft after a seven-month, 300-million-mile journey.
What has made the success even sweeter for Mohan is that the Perseverance rover, which will explore the Martian terrain and atmosphere, had a descent into Mars’ Jezero Crater that was described as “seven minutes of terror”.
“@DrSwatiMohan you made the Indian diaspora proud and inspire millions of young girls and generations to dream BIG. You broke the ceiling of ‘DREAM for the sky, you will hit the roof for sure’,” one admirer of Mohan gushed on Twitter.
Another wrote: “Got choked up seeing Dr Swati Mohan and showed my daughter. First thing she said: ‘look, she’s wearing a bindi too AND driving a rocket!’’’ remarked another, referring to the decorative forehead dot worn by Hindu women on the Indian subcontinent and elsewhere.
For Mohan, 38, an alumnus of Cornell University and Massachusetts Institute of Technology who migrated to the US with her parents from southern Karnataka when she was just a year old, the mission marked a personal and professional high. It was something she had dreamed of achieving ever since she became part of the Nasa operation in 2013.
Like Mohan, there are many other Indian women shooting for the skies as successful space scientists, engineers, satellite launchers, missile developers and project heads of complex interstellar missions. Broadening the horizons of science on Earth and beyond, they are shattering the glass ceiling while inspiring millions.
