During October 29-30, 2025, ISRO organised a national science meet on India’s first mission to Venus, viz. the Venus Orbiter Mission (VOM), in ISRO Headquarters, Bengaluru. It was attended by about 150 scientists, engineers, faculty members and Ph.D. students, comprising members from the ISRO/DOS, as well as national research and academic institutes. More than 70 members, representing about 40 research / academic institutions of the country outside DOS, actively participated in the meeting.

India’s Venus Orbiter Mission (VOM) will be a scientific mission, slated for launch in year 2028, which will address scientific problems on the Venusian atmosphere, clouds, aerosols, lightning, ionosphere, solar wind interactions, as well as the surface and subsurface of Venus.

The two-days long national science meet was organised with the objective of actively engaging the national science community, including academia and research institutes, towards maximizing the scientific potential of the mission. The meet aimed at strengthening the synergy between ISRO, national academia, and institutes, ensuring a collaborative approach to deep-space planetary exploration.

During his inaugural address, Dr. V. Narayanan, Chairman, ISRO / Secretary, DOS emphasised on the need of conveying the essence of the scientific missions of India to the Indian citizens, especially, to the non-experts, inspiring them to appreciate the potential of the space exploration, and India’s growing position in the global arena in the realm of space exploration. Shri A.S. Kiran Kumar, former Chairman, ISRO / Secretary, DOS, member space commission, brought out that India has demonstrated the capabilities to steer complex space science missions and the Venus mission has been India’s natural choice after having explored Moon and Mars in the pursuit of solar system exploration. Shri M. Ganesh Pillai, Scientific Secretary, ISRO underscored the importance of engagement of the national scientific community during the preparatory phase of the mission, in order to achieve the desired integrity and global competitiveness of the scientific objectives. Dr. Tirtha Pratim Das, Director of the Science Programme Office, ISRO Headquarters, appraised the scientific community about ISRO’s recent endeavour on preparing the scientific community for analysing Venusian science data through the Announcement of Opportunity (AO) recently floated by ISRO, to analyse the archival data of the global Venus missions.

The national science meet was structured to convey the key information on the scientific and technological aspects of the mission, as well as the outstanding problems on Venus that India’s VOM is intended to address. There were detailed discussions on the scientific instruments and techniques to be used in the VOM, towards the understanding of the Venusian atmosphere, clouds, aerosols, ionosphere, surface, sub-surface, as well as the interaction between the Sun and Venus. In addition to the brainstorming sessions, there were panel discussions with focus on modelling/simulation activities.