The rocket carrying the satellite blasted off at 10:24 am (0454 GMT) into a cloudy sky on a drizzly day from this remote site, about 100 kilometersmiles) north of the southern Indian city of Madras, an AFP correspondent saw.

After 18 minutes the satellite, named Resourcesat-1, was injected into orbit on schedule in what ISRO chairman Madhavan Nair described as a "textbook" launch.

"It was a tremendous achievement," Nair told reporters, adding that the launch vehicle, the locally-built Polar Satellite Launch Vehicle, had proved "fail-safe" as it had already sent six other satellites into orbit.

"It was a perfect textbook launch, with all the separations taking place at predetermined intervals," he said.

The launch comes after China Wednesday sent a man into space to join an elite club alongside Russia and the United States.

India has a keen space rivalry with its giant neighbour and just a few days after China said in January it would send a human into orbit, Indian Prime Minister Atal Behari Vajpayee publicly urged his country's scientists to work towards sending a man to the moon.

Last month the Indian cabinet approved a proposal by space authorities to send an unmanned mission to the moon by 2008.

Indian officials said the Resourcesat-1 launch had been planned and announced in September.

They said the satellite, India's most sophisticated remote sensing satellite so far, would provide continuity to the services of other remote sensing satellites that have far outlived their mission lives.

The space agency said Resourcesat-1 would also provide a further fillip for the application of remote sensing, especially in the areas of agriculture, disaster management, land and water resources.

India currently has four remote sensing satellites in orbit.

The Resourcesat-1 is the heaviest payload to be carried by the Polar Satellite Launch Vehicle, which has previously launched six satellites, most recently in September 2002.

SPACE.WIRE