It seems like we're entering a new Iridium era, and hopefully things will turn out better this time.

Hi - maybe it's because India doesn't have the Atlantic Ocean sitting next to it on its eastern coast, and instead has the Bay of Bengal? Country geography often affects rocket design, and perhaps that's yet another reason why no two countries have rockets which look exactly alike, in spite of the laws of physics being the same everywhere. Launching eastward from Sriharikota into the Bay of Bengal means that the amount of Delta V from the higher-thrust lower stages has to be capped, so that they don't pose any danger to the Thai/Malay peninsula on the other side. That cap means that a greater proportion of overall delta-v has to be supplied by the upper stage, which then favors a cryogenic upper stage as the solution for GTO missions. Maybe The Space Review could give us a dedicated article on the subject of launch geographies around the world, if it already hasn't - because it could make for a very interesting and enlightening topic.

I think you're blurring the line between the military as an organized, disciplined entity and the military as a security protection force. The hostile rigorous environment of space demands an organized and disciplined approach, which begs the question - do you have to be military in order to be organized and disciplined? The military typically use armaments to confront hostile actors - but when your main threat are the hostile elements, then do you really need an armed military force? I don't see why a country that doesn't have the military in national parades then needs to be putting a military face on space exploration.

Let the man continue talking - at his age, he's quite a marvel. He's a symbol of personal dynamism, who offers hope to the rest of us.

Hi, I think we're getting into hairsplitting here. Aravamudan said:
“Decades have passed by since then and this club has not increased in strength!”
Strength could be interpreted as launch capability, which aforementioned additional countries have not demonstrated that much of, in terms of stuff launched.
I'll concede on the "Mars mission" point, but as a multi-national entity, ESA is still a multi-national mission, rather than a single-nation effort.

Hi, just a few points:

Technically, the first launch of the GSLV-Mark-III was on Dec-18-2014, but was an atmospheric flight only. Next month's launch is the first orbital flight of the vehicle.
Nextly, ESA is a multi- national entity supported by not 1 but 22 countries (Austria, Belgium, Czech Republic, Denmark, Estonia, Finland, France, Germany, Greece, Hungary, Ireland, Italy, Luxembourg, The Netherlands, Norway, Poland, Portugal, Romania, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland and the United Kingdom) - between them, they've all won more Olympic medals than the United States, but that doesn't necessarily make for an Apples-to-Apples comparison.
Finally, Israel, Iran, North & South Korea may have technically achieved a token orbital launch capability, but they haven't launched much in the way of payloads. Out of these, South Korea may have the best hardware, but they haven't used it much. ISRO is launching just about every month these days.
So for practical purposes, the things Aravamudan said weren't necessarily exaggerations.

As an Indian, I feel that ISRO should be kept separate from military activities, in order to avoid complications to itself and its image. At most, ISRO should launch satellites dedicated for military use, but operational control should quickly be handed off to the military, so that ISRO is removed from military applications and operations. India's military activities are often enmeshed in the messy geopolitics of the region, and there's no benefit for ISRO to be bogged down in that. Additionally, there are ominous signs that Pakistan's ISI is now increasingly turning its attentions towards espionage against ISRO

Rubbish - it is Pakistan which is a terrorist state that has no right to launch terror atttacks, whether against Uri or against NYC and NewJersey on orders of Quetta Shura.

they need to bring back lightgun games

Be fair Mike - when India started investing in computerization during the 1980s to save money on its huge bureaucracy, foreign critics likewise said the same thing you did: "It's wrong for India to buy computers - you can't feed poor people a stack of floppy disks"

But today if you see how information technology has enabled Indians to grow their economy and generate revenue to lift millions of people out of poverty each year, then you'll see that India's old focus on agriculture exclusively was a bad idea. Engineering exports are the fastest growing sector of the Indian economy, and are responsible for much of India's growth. Aerospace is obviously the holy grail of high-end engineering, and having a domestic space program helps India build expertise in this area too.

And before you start complaining about lost jobs, please understand that the cost of space access is the fundamental bottleneck holding back much wider commercial applications in space, and having additional players like India bring their cost benefits to the marketplace can only help it grow. Likewise, don't blame Elon Musk for touting "everyday low prices" instead of the "rug bazaar".

Space is such a big opportunity with such vast potential, that it would be a shame to let navel-gazing to allow the bottlenecks to stay in place, choking off the future.