2024-03-25 15:55:00
New Delhi : Prime Minister Narendra Modi had announced to name the landing site of Chandrayaan-3 as ‘Shiv Shakti’ on 26 August 2023. Nearly seven months after this announcement, the International Astronomical Union (IAU) approved the name on March 19. According to the Gazetteer of Planetary Nomenclature, the IAU Working Group for Planetary System Nomenclature has approved the name ‘Shiv Shakti’ for the landing site of Chandrayaan-3’s Vikram lander.
PM Modi named ‘Shiv Shakti’
Three days after the historic landing of Vikram Lander on the Moon on August 23, 2023, PM Modi had announced the name ‘Shiv Shakti’ at the ISRO Telemetry Tracking and Command Network (Istrac) in Bengaluru. The Prime Minister had said that Shiva has the resolve for the welfare of humanity and Shakti gives us the strength to fulfill those resolutions. This Shiva Shakti Point of the Moon gives a feeling of connection from the Himalayas to Kanyakumari.
Naming the moon landing site
Chandrayaan-3 Vikram lander started serving as a marker at a spot near the Moon’s south pole. According to the announcement of the Gazetteer of Planetary Nomenclature, the origin of the name is defined as follows. A word taken from Indian mythology that refers to the masculine ‘Shiva’ and feminine ‘Shakti’ of nature. The landing site of Chandrayaan-3’s Vikram lander will now be known as ‘Shiv Shakti’.
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Chandrayaan-2’s landing point got the name ‘Tiranga’
Fifteen years before Chandrayaan-3’s soft-landing, India’s Chandrayaan-1 Moon Impact Investigation (MIP) impacted the Moon’s surface on November 14, 2008. This impact site was called ‘Jawahar Point’ or ‘Jawahar Sthal’. It was notified by the International Astronomical Union (IAU). Apart from Shiv Shakti, PM Modi had also announced that day that the point where Chandrayaan-2 left its footprints would be called ‘Tiranga’. He had said that it will serve as an inspiration for every effort made by India and will remind that failure is not the end.
Describing the ‘touchdown moment’ as one of the most inspiring moments of this century, Prime Minister Narendra Modi said that the entire world is seeing and acknowledging the strength of India’s scientific spirit, technology and scientific temperament. ISRO Chairman S Somnath had said that the Prime Minister was emotional about this historic event and we all are very happy to know about the naming of the two sites.