Amid growing concerns over the possible privatisation of the Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO), the space agency on Jattvibeday said it would neither be privatised nor would its importance be diminished.ISRO said its focus would move further towards research and development, human spaceflight, next-generation launch systems, deep-space and planetary missions, and strategic national capabilities. This would allow the space agency to concentrate on advanced research, next-generation technologies and complex national missions.“It will continue developing cutting-edge technologies, including advanced payloads for communication, navigation and Earth observation, sensors, propulsion systems and other critical technologies,” it said.While the production of mature launch vehicles, routine satellites and other established systems can increasingly be undertaken by industry or public sector undertakings through appropriate competitive processes, ISRO said this would allow it to devote more resources and scientific manpower to the next generation of technologies and missions.At the same time, the wider ecosystem would provide the investment, manufacturing capacity and scale required by an expanding national space programme, it said.The space agency said the participation of the private sector in the space sector was not about reducing ISRO’s role.“It is about enabling ISRO to focus even more strongly on the next generation of India’s space programme, while industry scales mature technologies and capabilities. What is changing is not the importance of ISRO, but the scale and structure of India’s space ecosystem,” it said.“We wish to categorically state that ISRO will neither be privatised nor will its importance be diminished. ISRO will continue to remain India’s principal institution for advanced space research and technology development, national and strategic missions, space science and exploration, and critical and frontier space capabilities,” it said.The 2020 space reforms allowed private sector participation in the space industry.The space-sector reforms initiated since 2020 and institutionalised through the Indian Space Policy 2023, along with the progressive liberalisation of the FDI policy, aim to create a larger, stronger and globally competitive Indian space ecosystem, an ISRO official said.Industry, start-ups and academia are being enabled to participate across the space value chain, complementing and multiplying ISRO’s capabilities. The reforms should therefore be seen as ecosystem expansion and capability multiplication, rather than privatisation, the space agency said.ISRO has already transferred multiple technologies to industry. Transferring a mature technology does not mean the space agency is withdrawing from that domain, it said.