India plans to build its own space station by 2028

Signals Inbox·August 3, 2026·SpaceTech

India is moving from sending astronauts into orbit to building a permanent home for them. Its first Bharatiya Antariksh Station module is targeted for 2028, with a five-module station planned by 2035, just as the ISS prepares to retire and China expands Tiangong.

Q1What is India actually building?

India’s government has approved the development and launch of BAS-01, the first module of the Bharatiya Antariksh Station, for 2028. This is not the full station. India plans to connect five modules and make the complete station operational by 2035.

Q2Why does the timing matter?

Because the current space-station era is ending. NASA plans to retire the International Space Station after 2030, while China already operates Tiangong and is preparing to expand it. India wants its first module in orbit before that transition is complete, giving it an independent base instead of depending entirely on foreign or future commercial stations.

Q3How big will India’s station be?

The current plan is roughly 52 tonnes across five modules. That would make it much smaller than the roughly 420-tonne ISS and somewhat smaller than China’s current Tiangong station. It is still far beyond a simple crew capsule. India would need living areas, laboratories, life support, power, docking ports, cargo deliveries, and emergency systems working together for years.

Q4Can India actually assemble it?

India cleared one major hurdle in January 2025 when its SpaDeX satellites docked in orbit. That made India only the fourth country, after the United States, Russia, and China, to demonstrate space docking. ISRO later repeated the docking and transferred power between the satellites. Those are exactly the kinds of skills needed to connect station modules in orbit.

Q5Is India catching China?

Not yet. China launched Tiangong’s core module in 2021, completed its first three-module configuration in 2022, and regularly keeps astronauts aboard. India has not yet completed its first independent crewed Gaganyaan flight. So India is at least one full human-spaceflight generation behind, but a 2028 station module would show that it is trying to close the gap quickly.

Q6What is the real signal?

India no longer sees Gaganyaan as a one-off flag mission. It is building the docking systems, crew vehicles, rockets, life support, and orbital modules needed for a permanent national program. The tension is execution: launching one module by 2028 is ambitious, but keeping a station supplied and crewed through 2035 will be far harder than putting the first piece into orbit.

Q7So should I care?

Yes, because low Earth orbit is breaking into separate power centers. China has Tiangong, the United States is backing commercial stations, and India wants its own government-run base. If BAS reaches orbit on schedule, space stations stop being mainly a US-Russian story and become another part of the competition between Asia’s largest powers.