New Delhi, Mar 18: Indian Air Force (IAF) Group Captain Shubhanshu Shukla – set to become the first Indian to go to the International Space Station (ISS) soon – Tuesday urged fellow citizens to not be afraid to dream big and to pursue it one step at a time.

Shukla, in an exclusive interaction with IANS from American private space company Axiom Space's headquarters in Houston, Texas, spoke about his journey from Indian Air Force to Axiom Space, and the experiments he will undertake during the impending mission to the orbiting lab.

“Don't be afraid to dream big and, pursue that dream one step at a time. And, sooner than later, you would realise that you are very close to that,” said the Lucknow-born astronaut-designate for the historic Gaganyaan mission -- India's first human spaceflight mission.

Shukla will be the second Indian to go to space, four decades after Rakesh Sharma flew to space station Salyut 7. Born on October 10, 1985, Shukla graduated from the National Defence Academy (NDA) in 2005, and was commissioned into the Fighter stream of the Indian Air Force in June 2006.

He was included in the astronaut selection process by ISRO in 2019, after Prime Minister Narendra Modi in 2018 announced from the Red Fort that a son or daughter of India would go to space very soon.

In January 2025, the 39-year-old astronaut was selected as the pilot for Axiom Space’s Mission 4 (Ax-4) -- a collaborative mission between NASA and ISRO.

“I was glad to be eligible at that point in time....This experience will be extremely beneficial as we move forward and contribute to the future of human spaceflight," said Shukla, terming it as a “huge accomplishment”.

“Although it's a very exciting place to be, I understand the kind of responsibility it puts on me. It is a kind of representation of the entire nation, and, so this is the beginning of a long journey,” said Shukla.

Shukla said he hopes to use his “journey to inspire this entire generation to pursue their careers in the field of space”, as he “was extremely inspired and motivated”, by Rakesh Sharma’ visit to space in 1984.

The Axion Space’s mission to ISS -- expected to launch from the Kennedy Space Center in Florida aboard a SpaceX Dragon spacecraft in May -- will likely last up to 14 days. The crew will conduct scientific experiments, outreach programmes and commercial activities in microgravity. Shukla will serve as the mission pilot during the transit, that is, while going from Earth to the orbiting lab and coming back to the Earth.

“During the transit journey, I'm going to be acting as the mission pilot, so I will be working alongside the commander of the vehicle, managing the systems, navigating the vehicle, and looking at all the data that is available, and if required, intervening and, interacting with the systems, if something was to go wrong or there was a need for a manual intervention,” Shukla told IANS.

While in space, he will partake in experiments aimed to advance the technologies to build Axiom’s own space station, and the effect of microgravity on cyanobacteria -- a type of bacteria which has got an anaerobic pathway.

The bacteria -- capable of converting carbon dioxide to oxygen -- was also responsible for generation of oxygen on Earth.

“Cyanobacteria is being studied to see how well they can perform the activity in microgravity and the possibility of utilising them for future missions to provide an environment, an oxygen rich environment for the crew who is going to stay,” said an excited Shukla.

(IANS)

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