Russia was once in collaboration for Chandrayaan-2 mission, but why ISRO took the decision to walk alone?

Isro has once again made India proud by successfully launching Chandrayaan-2. But, once Russia used to be a partner of India in this mission... 

Chandrayaan-2 lifts off with the GSLV MK-III rocket from Satish Dhawan Space Centre. 

Credits: ISRO 

India has once again proved its supremacy in space by successfully launching its lunar mission Chandrayaan-2. The whole world's eyes were on this mission. With this successful launch, ISRO has again established itself as the most successful Space Agency of world. Let's remind you that ISRO's success rate is far better than the space agencies of other countries. Not only this, ISRO's GSLV MK-III rocket's success rate is also 100 percent.

Read also: 50 years ago on this date, man had put the first step on the moon: here's the untold story of this mission

Although today India is alone in this mission, but a few years ago, the Russian space agency ROSCOSMOS had made an agreement with ISRO for collaboration in this ambitious mission. The agreement was made in 2007, according to which the mission was to be launched in 2013. Under the agreement, Russia had to make Payload Lander - an important part of this mission, while India had to prepare rover and orbiter for this mission. However, the lander sent by Russia was not according to ISRO's requirement.

NASA and ESA were also interested in this mission

So after this, the Indian Space Agency ISRO decided to complete this mission on its own. However, according to some reports, NASA and the European Space Agency (ESA) were also interested in collaborating in this ambitious mission of India, but ISRO still decided to go alone and completed the project by successfully launching it on 22 July.

It is worth mentioning here that compared to the lunar missions of other three countries - China, the US and Russia - ISRO has accomplished this feat in very low budget. After this success, India has joined the elite group of three major countries that  has successfully sent mission to moon (384,600 km or 239,000 miles).

The budget of Chandrayaan-2 is half that of Avenger's Endgame

You will be surprised to know that ISRO has made this project possible on half the expense of the Hollywood blockbuster Avengers Endgame. The budget of Chandrayaan-2 is about $124 million. Out of which, about $ 31 million was spent on the launch of this mission and $93 million dollars on its satellite. If you talk about Avengers Endgame Movie, then it's budget was $356 million. To recall, before this, the success of Chandrayaan-1 also helped the entire world and science community to unravel the mysteries of the moon by finding the traces of water molecules there.