Bodoland scales up space education: 15 government schools get ISRO-aligned labs

Syllad | The Rising MeghalayaAugust 29, 2025

The Bodoland Territorial Region (BTR) has scaled up its Bodoland Space Education Programme to 15 government schools, equipping classrooms with modern laboratories, telescopes, and ISRO-aligned curriculum aimed at igniting scientific curiosity among students.

The initiative, championed by BTR Chief Pramod Boro, was launched in 2024 with the first School Space Lab at Sidli-Kashikotra Higher Secondary School, Chirang. In just over a year, it has expanded into a network covering four districts—Kokrajhar, Chirang, Baksa, and Udalguri—making it the first government-school space lab programme of its kind in Northeast India.

The labs are designed to turn imagination into practical learning. Students get access to telescopes for night-sky observation, scaled PSLV/GSLV launcher models, CanSat-style payload kits, and microcontroller experiments covering sensors, propulsion, and telemetry. Teachers undergo training boot camps by Vyomika Space Academy, an ISRO-recognised Space Tutor partner, ensuring that space experiments are tied to the state curriculum.

“Students of our school are always excited to attend the classes at the Space Lab, and I am optimistic that our school will be able to produce space scientists of the future,” said Manju Boro, Principal of Sidli-Kashikotra Higher Secondary School.

Local identity, national vision

To strengthen community ownership, each lab has been named after local educators and leaders, including the Chino Basumatary Memorial Space Lab in Chirang, the Mathias Tudu Memorial Space Lab in Kokrajhar, and the Baliram Boro Memorial Space Lab in Udalguri. Officials say this naming choice connects cutting-edge science with local pride.

Parents also see the labs as transformative. “The thought of black holes swallowing light, galaxies stretching endlessly, or humans living on other planets sparks both wonder and determination,” said Prabhat Basumatary, father of a 16-year-old student. Many students dream of working for ISRO, NASA, or private players like SpaceX.

A milestone on National Space Day

The programme’s 15-lab milestone coincided with National Space Day 2025, celebrated on August 23 with the theme Aryabhatta to Gaganyaan: Ancient Wisdom to Infinite Possibilities. District-level events saw students building water-propelled rockets, designing payloads, and presenting concepts of orbital motion in Assamese, Bodo, and English.

Vyomika Space Academy reports that more than 3,000 students across BTR have already engaged in hands-on space activities, showing that the facilities are not symbolic but actively used.

Why Bodoland, why now?

BTR’s education mission has long focused on reducing learning disparities in science and technology. Alongside infrastructure upgrades, the government has invested in university expansion, smart classrooms, and skill-based education. The Space Education Programme fits into this vision by giving tribal students access to a stream of science that is often seen as elite and distant.

Academic observers note that space education nurtures creativity and problem-solving while inspiring long-term career pathways in STEM. By linking young learners to India’s national space story—from Aryabhatta to Chandrayaan and Gaganyaan—the programme seeks to anchor Bodoland firmly within the country’s scientific future.

From classrooms to cosmos

For BTR, the Space Labs are more than a symbolic leap. They are a pipeline from classrooms to innovation hubs and internships, preparing students for opportunities in India’s rapidly expanding space sector.

As one education official put it, the image of teenagers in Bijni or Sidli aligning telescopes and debugging microcontrollers “is more than a feel-good photo. It is a practical bet that opportunity in the 2030s will flow through labs like these—and Bodoland’s students must be at the front of that queue.”