Rahul Gandhi to begin early Gujarat campaign for 2019 polls
Ahmedabad, June 30: Congress President Rahul Gandhi will kickstart the early campaign in Gujarat for the 2019 Lok Sabha elections with his visits on July 11 and July 15.
Rahul Gandhi had extensively toured the state during the 2017 Assembly elections and was credited for his party's improved performance with a tally of 77 seats, up from 54 in 2012, in the 182-seat house.
Beginning Gujarat campaign of 2017, he was seen to have adopted a more aggressive style of hitting out at ruling Bharatiya Janata Party and its leadership.
Rahul Gandhi will visit the crucial Saurashtra region's Junagadh, Rajkot and Bhavnagar districts. It was in this region that the Congress made a major comeback after two long decades and won a majority of the seats.
Party sources said he would also have long meetings and discussion with the state leaders.
Gandhi is expected to make at least three to four such visits till December to re-establish his connect with the people here.
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ISRO successfully conducts second integrated air drop test for Gaganyaan mission
New Delhi (PTI): Space agency ISRO has successfully conducted the second integrated air drop test (IADT-02) for the upcoming Gaganyaan mission at the space station in Andhra Pradesh's Sriharikota.
The system is essential to ensure a safe recovery of the crew module -- the capsule in which astronauts sit during a human flight -- during re-entry and landing.
Union minister Jitendra Singh congratulated the Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) for successfully conducting the test.
"Congratulations #ISRO for the successful accomplishment of Second Integrated Air Drop Test (IADT-02) for #Gaganyaan, India's first Human Space flight scheduled next year. The second Integrated Air Drop Test (IADT-02) was successfully conducted at Satish Dhawan Space Station Sriharikota," Singh said in a post on X.
The IADT-02 follows the successful completion of the first IADT, which took place on August 24, 2025, at the Satish Dhawan Space Centre in Sriharikota.
Air drop tests recreate the last leg of a spacecraft's return to Earth. An aircraft or helicopter drops the spacecraft from a height to test various systems under different scenarios.
These are the deployment of the parachute system in case the mission is aborted mid-flight, system performance when one parachute fails to open and the spacecraft's orientation and safety during splashdown etc.
In the IADT-02 test, a simulated crew module, weighing about 5.7 tonnes, was lifted by an Indian Air Force Chinook helicopter to an altitude of about three kilometres and released over a designated drop zone in the sea, near the Sriharikota coast.
In a statement, the ISRO said, "Ten parachutes of four types were deployed in a precise sequence during the descent of the crew module, gradually reducing the velocity for safe touchdown. Subsequently, the simulated crew module was successfully recovered in coordination with the Indian Navy."
