The United States and India have been partners in space ever since the Indian space program began in 1972. Unfortunately, NASA and the Indian Space Research Organization (ISRO) have temporarily ended plans to train an Indian astronaut that hoped to be on board a manned shuttle launch later this year.

The reason for this was that NASA manned missions currently are being sent into space to either work on the International Space Station (ISS) or to do general repairs on the Hubble space telescope.

NASA and the ISRO have agreed to put two US built science instruments on board the Chandrayaan, which will be India's first unmanned moon explorer. The spacecraft may launch as early as 2008. One instrument will look for polar ice while the other will study the surface mineral composition on the moon.

This news article was written on May 9, 2006, quoting Monsters And Critics.