Saarc satellite renamed South Asian satellite

The proposed Saarc satellite will now be rebranded as the South Asian satellite after Pakistan dropped out from the project, said a senior official of the telecom division.

To launch it as a Saarc satellite, consent from all member nations of the South Asian Association for Regional Cooperation is required.

The idea of Saarc satellite was first put forward by Indian Prime Narendra Modi during the association's summit in Nepal in November 2014.

The satellite was meant to be a gift from India, which will design, build, launch and maintain it, for the benefit of Saarc members in various fields including telecom and tele-medicine.

Bangladesh, Sri Lanka, Bhutan, the Maldives and Nepal responded positively to the idea, but Pakistan and Afghanistan refused to join the consortium, halting the project. Now, India has decided to launch it under a new moniker with its own costs. The Indian Space Research Organisation is aiming to launch the satellite by March next year.

The Bangladesh government has decided to get on board with the South Asian satellite even though it might create some interference with the country's Bangabandhu-1 satellite downlink.

In satellite telecommunication, a downlink is the link from a satellite down to one or more ground stations or receivers.

“We have taken expert comments from the BTRC about the South Asian satellite,” said Md Faizur Rahman Chowdhury, secretary of the telecom division.

Subsequently, the foreign ministry has been asked to inform New Delhi about Dhaka's nod, with a preliminary agreement likely to be signed during Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina's visit to India in December, he said.

The preliminary agreement has already been drafted after several meetings between the telecom division, the Bangladesh Telecommunication Regulatory Commission and the foreign ministry, the official said.

The South Asian satellite's lifetime will be 12 years, with the ability to cover the Saarc region only with its 12 transponders, according to the concept paper. One transponder is equivalent to 36 megahertz.

The Bangabandhu-1 satellite will have a capacity of 40 transponders and cover Indonesia and the Philippines as well as Turkmenistan, Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan.

“So the South Asian satellite will hardly be of use to us. Since we do not have to contribute toward its cost, we have decided to join the consortium,” said the telecom division official.

The Bangabandhu-1 satellite will have a lifetime of 15 years and will be launched by December 2017 at a cost of Tk 2,967 crore. The project got the  prestigious “Recognition of Excellence” award from the International Telecommunication Union last week.