Even as the Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) expresses relief over the lifting of US curbs on three of its units, three other major units of the space agency remain on America's restricted entities' list.
A top ISRO official said that the three major units still on the entities' list of the US department of commerce were the Liquid Propulsion System Centre and the Vikram Sarabhai Space Centre in Thiruvananthapuram and the Satish Dhawan Space Centre at Sriharikota in Andhra Pradesh.
"We consider the lifting of restrictions on importing critical components as a positive development, as it eases our procurement process and enables us to place orders with US firms hereafter," the official said.
"But the US decision applies only to three of our subordinate entities — ISRO Telemetry, Tracking and Command Network (ISTRAC) and ISRO Inertial Systems Unit (IISU), which are based in Thiruvananthapuram, and the Space Applications Centre (SAC) in Ahmedabad."
Since the ban was imposed in the wake of India's nuclear tests at Pokhran in May 1988, ISRO has been sourcing its high-technology requirements from other countries, especially in Europe and Japan.
Though the US lifted sanctions against India post 9/11, the import of dual use technologies by ISRO and Indian nuclear facilities were restricted by retaining them on the entities' list.
