ISRO official puts TRISHNA launch 12–16 months away

The Indian-French TRISHNA satellite is at an advanced stage of development and could launch within 12–16 months, U.R. Rao Satellite Centre official Jasvinder Singh Khoral said on October 11.

He gave the estimate at the TRISHNA Water for Tomorrow workshop. The project has moved from conceptual preparation to building the spacecraft, he said, without announcing an exact launch date, The Hindu reported.

The Indian Space Research Organisation and France's space agency CNES are jointly developing the mission. The U.R. Rao Satellite Centre is responsible for the satellite platform and payload integration. The spacecraft will carry a French thermal infrared instrument and an Indian optical instrument.

TRISHNA is intended to monitor surface temperature and variables relevant to water-resource assessment. Project director A.M. Nagalakshmi said scientific data would be shared under an open-data policy. Processing is expected to take place jointly in India and France.

The satellite is planned to launch aboard a PSLV rocket. CNES lists 2027 as the planned launch year on its main project page. Khoral's estimate remains a planning outlook, rather than a fixed launch date.