India has the capability to develop a space station, Indian Space Research Organisation Chairman AS Kiran Kumar said on Monday. At the foundation day ceremony of the Raja Ramanna Center for Advanced Technology, Kumar said Isro would “okay” the project to develop a space station, “the day the country takes the decision”, PTI reported.

“We still talk about what would be the immediate benefits of a manned space mission,” Kumar said. “That is why the country has not made up its mind about when to invest in a space station,” he said. Realising the project requires long-term thinking as well as policy and funding support from the government, he said.

Isro was also considering tying up with the private space industry to enhance India’s satellite launching capability, Kumar said, adding that it was necessary to increase the number of satellites monitoring the land and weather conditions on the country and enhance its communication network. “We need to conduct around 18 launches per year, almost three times to our existing capacity,” he said, according to The Free Press Journal. “Our priority is India first. When we have some excess capacity we are maximising the return.”

Kumar’s remarks come after Isro on February 15 launched a world record 104 satellites from Sriharikota in Andhra Pradesh. The space agency’s Polar Satellite Launch Vehicle-C37 carried a payload of 103 nano-satellites from India and five other countries – Israel, Kazakhstan, Netherlands, United States and Switzerland – as well as an indigenous Cartostat-2, which is an Earth observation instrument.