The Mars Orbiter Mission (MOM), unofficially known as Mangalyaan (a concept/act of space exploration), is India's first interplanetary space probe. It was created by the Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) and launched on November 5, 2013, from the Satish Dhawan Space Centre. The mission's primary purpose was to solve the technological challenge of designing, planning, and operating an interplanetary mission, demonstrating India's capability in deep space communication and navigation.
Mangalyaan successfully entered Mars orbit on September 24, 2014, making ISRO the first Asian space agency and the fourth globally to achieve this feat. The spacecraft was launched using the Polar Satellite Launch Vehicle (PSLV) C25. The mechanism involved a long, highly elliptical orbit around Mars, from which it conducted scientific observations. It carried five indigenous instruments, including the Mars Color Camera and the Methane Sensor for Mars, to study the Martian surface, morphology, mineralogy, and atmosphere. For instance, the Mars Exospheric Neutral Composition Analyzer (MENCA) was used to investigate the neutral composition of the Martian exosphere.
The mission was designed for a six-month life but operated for about seven and a half years, observing Mars from 2014 to 2022. This mission connects directly to ISRO's broader planetary exploration efforts, including the Chandrayaan lunar missions and the planned follow-up mission, Mars Orbiter Mission 2 (Mangalyaan 2). The mission concluded around April 2022 when communication was lost, likely due to fuel exhaustion, but the technological and scientific objectives were successfully achieved.