In December 2025, ISRO logged its 100th orbital launch. Its most reliable rocket has flown 61 times, with only 3 outright failures. This article covers India’s launch vehicles — PSLV, GSLV, LVM3, and the newer SSLV — and what each one actually does.
Timeline
- 7 August 2022: SSLV-D1, ISRO’s smallest rocket, debuts — but suffers a launch failure.
- 30 July 2025: GSLV F16 launches NISAR, a joint NASA-ISRO satellite — its first flight to Sun-Synchronous Polar Orbit.
- 24 December 2025: LVM3-M6 becomes ISRO’s 100th orbital launch overall.
- Targeted Q1 2026: SSLV L1, the vehicle’s first fully operational flight, carrying the PARIKSHIT payload.
🏛️ Must Know
India’s Four Launch Vehicle Classes
- India uses four main launch vehicles: PSLV, GSLV, LVM3 (formerly GSLV Mk III), and the newer SSLV.
- PSLV has flown 61 times: 57 successful, 1 partial success, 3 failures. It’s ISRO’s most reliable workhorse.
- LVM3-M6, launched 24 December 2025, was ISRO’s 100th orbital launch overall.
- GSLV F16 launched NISAR — a joint NASA-ISRO Earth-observation satellite — on 30 July 2025.
📘 Good to Know
What Each Recent Flight Achieved
- SSLV debuted on 7 August 2022, but failed its first flight. It has flown three times since: 2 successful, 1 failure.
- SSLV’s first serial, fully operational flight — SSLV L1 — is targeted to carry the PARIKSHIT payload.
- LVM3-M6 also carried a commercial payload: AST SpaceMobile’s BlueBird-6 communications satellite, LVM3’s third commercial mission.
- ISRO is developing a Next Generation Launch Vehicle (NGLV), built around reusable technology.
📝 Previous Year Questions
UPSC CSP 2018 — What’s Actually True About PSLV and GSLV
- UPSC 2018 PSLVs genuinely launch Earth-resources satellites while GSLVs mainly launch communication satellites, so statement 1 is correct. PSLV satellites do not appear fixed in the sky from Earth (that describes geostationary orbits, not PSLV’s typical polar/sun-synchronous orbits), and GSLV Mk III is a three-stage vehicle, not four-staged, so statements 2 and 3 are both wrong. See UPSC CSP 2018 GS Paper I, Q95. View this question.
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🌟 Great to Know
Why Four Different Vehicles Exist
- Four vehicle classes do four different jobs. PSLV handles reliable mid-weight and polar-orbit launches. GSLV and LVM3 handle heavier geostationary payloads. SSLV exists for quick, on-demand small-satellite launches.
- GSLV’s cryogenic upper stage has a difficult history behind it. See SciTech0074 — Nambi Narayanan, on the scientist who led this work and was wrongly accused of espionage in 1994.
- SSLV’s fail-then-recover pattern — a failed debut, then two straight successes — isn’t unusual. PSLV itself went through a similar arc decades earlier, before becoming ISRO’s most trusted rocket.
- The move toward NGLV signals a strategic pivot. After decades spent building reliable expendable rockets, ISRO’s next competitive edge is reusability — the same shift that made SpaceX commercially viable.
- For the broader ISRO programme — satellites, Chandrayaan, and the Mars mission — see SciTech0007 — India’s Space Programme.
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