Who was the first woman of Indian origin to go to space?

Kalpana Chawla (1962-2003) was born on 17 March 1962 in Karnal, in present-day Haryana. She studied aeronautical engineering at the Punjab Engineering College, Chandigarh, and then moved to the USA, where she earned a master's degree from the University of Texas at Arlington and a PhD in aerospace engineering from the University of Colorado. She became an American citizen in 1991 and joined NASA's astronaut corps in 1995.

Her first space flight was on the Space Shuttle Columbia (mission STS-87), from 19 November to 5 December 1997. She served as a mission specialist and the primary robotic arm operator. This made her the first woman of Indian origin to go to space.

Her second flight was also on Columbia, mission STS-107, in January 2003. On 1 February 2003, as the shuttle was returning to Earth, it broke apart over Texas while re-entering the atmosphere, killing all seven crew members, including Kalpana Chawla. The disaster was caused by damage to the heat-protecting tiles on the left wing, made by a piece of foam that broke off during launch. She had spent a total of about 30 days in space.

She was posthumously awarded the US Congressional Space Medal of Honor and the NASA Space Flight Medal. India named its first weather satellite, MetSat-1, "Kalpana-1" in her honour in 2003.

Other Indians and Indian-origin people in space:

• Rakesh Sharma, the first Indian citizen in space, flew on the Soviet Soyuz T-11 in 1984.
• Sunita Williams, of Indian origin, has made long stays on the International Space Station.
• Shubhanshu Shukla became the first Indian to visit the International Space Station, on the Axiom-4 mission in 2025.

Why not the other options?

• ✗Sunita Williams went to space later, first in 2006.
• ✗Sirisha Bandla, born in Andhra Pradesh, flew on Virgin Galactic's sub-orbital flight in 2021.
• ✗Valentina Tereshkova of the USSR was the first woman in space (1963).