Madhavan Nair, chairman of the Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO), the country's premier space agency, said the scientific community in the country had already started a debate on the manned mission.

"The question of a manned mission is glaring before us now," Nair told AFP ahead of a lunar conference which kicks off in the northern Indian city of Udaipur on Monday.

"The thought process has begun and various agencies have come up with ideas. Whether it is now or later is a question to be considered," Nair said.

"We have not taken it up to the government level yet. But if we are asked to ... and are given adequate funding, we can achieve it in six to seven years from today," he said.

India sent its first astronaut, Rakesh Sharma, aboard Soviet spacecraft Salyut 7 in April 1984 while another astronaut, Kalpana Chawla, was killed along with six others in the Columbia shuttle disaster in February last year.

Nair said "a lot of debate" had to take place in India before a final decision is taken on a manned space flight.

"The benefits and the costs involved have to be examined. Various facilities and equipment such as a space capsule for human habitation, shielding, control and safety features have to be built - a large amount of funding is required," he said.

India's unmanned lunar flight, Chandrayaan (Moon Journey), slated to launch by the end of 2007 or early 2008, was on schedule, Nair said.

"The design work for Chandrayaan has been completed and we are in the phase of implementing various types of prototypes," he said. "Building instruments and calibrating them to match exact conditions on the moon is a big challenge.

"We do not expect any difficulty with respect to the spacecraft and launch vehicle. The acquisition of land for deep space exploration has also been completed. Things are progressing well for the targetted launch latest by early 2008," he said.

The mission, to place a 525 kilogram (1,125 pound) orbiter using an indigenously-built polar satellite launch vehicle, is slated to cost the agency 83 million dollars.

The satellite will go around the polar orbit about 100 kilometersmiles) above the moon.

Critics have slammed the mission saying it is outdated and the organisation was wasting its money from a limited budget of 25 billion rupees (543 million dollars) allotted by the government.

They say cash-strapped India should not undertake the mission but instead restrict its space programmes to satellite launches and use its funds for social welfare.

But ISRO chief Nair defended the mission and said it would spur the Indian scientific community and probe the physical characteristics of the lunar surface in greater depth than previous missions by other nations.

"It will explore its minerals, map the terrain and find out whether water and helium deposits exist. It will also give us a deeper understanding about the planet Earth itself or its origins," he said.

"Earlier missions did not come out with a full understanding of the moon and that is the reason scientists are still interested.

"We do not want to take a beaten track," Nair said. "We have to find our own answers and see whether it is a cost-effective solution and it is going to bring benefits."

The US, Russia and Japan have already carried out moon missions and China is planning an unmanned space flight next year.

The ISRO is considering proposals from the US, Europe and France to carry auxiliary payload on the satellite, Nair said.

"There are about half-a-dozen proposals which are in their final stages," he said.

The lunar conference in Udaipur is being attended by about 200 Indian and foreign delegates from countries such as the United States, Europe, Japan, Russia and China.

All rights reserved. � 2004 Agence France-Presse. Sections of the information displayed on this page (dispatches, photographs, logos) are protected by intellectual property rights owned by Agence France-Presse. As a consequence, you may not copy, reproduce, modify, transmit, publish, display or in any way commercially exploit any of the content of this section without the prior written consent of Agence France-Presse.

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