Mumbai: The Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) is planning to set up a space platform in the next 25-20 years, its chairman G Madhavan Nair said.

He was speaking at the DEI deemed university, Dayalbagh on ISRO programmes for the future.

He said a space platform would help bring back a capsule safely to earth. Normally the capsule is either damaged or destroyed.

By reclaiming it safely, the capsule could be used again, he said. The platform can also be used to send rockets with a range of 100-150 km, he added.

The ISRO chairman said the Chandrayan I satellite mission would be launched by March next year. The satellite would be prospecting for minerals orbiting the moon some ten km away from its surface.