Updated on: 21 Jul 2026
BENGALURU: The next meeting of the India-US Civil Space Joint Working Group (CSJWG) will be held in Bengaluru during the first week of August, further strengthening bilateral cooperation in the space sector.
US Consulate General Public Diplomacy Officer Eric Atkins said experts from India and the United States would participate in the meeting to discuss cooperation in civil space programmes.
Speaking to reporters, Atkins said the previous CSJWG meeting was held in February 2025, attended by Prime Minister Narendra Modi and US President Donald Trump. He added that the upcoming Bengaluru meeting would bring together experts from both countries for bilateral discussions on space collaboration.
The CSJWG, established in 2005, serves as a platform for officials from the Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO), NASA and other government agencies from both countries to discuss cooperation in space research and technology.
India and the United States have collaborated on several major space initiatives, including the NASA-ISRO Synthetic Aperture Radar (NISAR) mission, which was launched in 2025.
Highlighting the growing partnership, Atkins said recent collaborations included the Axiom-4 mission, in which India’s Gaganyatri and Group Captain Shubhanshu Shukla participated, as well as the NISAR satellite mission. He added that there remains significant potential to expand cooperation in the space sector.
NASA Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) space scientist and AstroNav Project Manager Swati Mohan, who is visiting Bengaluru, also interacted with the media and spoke about the achievements of the Mars 2020 Perseverance Rover.
She said the rover has exceeded its planned three-Earth-year mission and continues to operate successfully. Its primary objective of collecting rock samples that may provide evidence of ancient life on Mars has been achieved, she added.
Mohan further said that 33 samples collected from the Cheyava Falls region on Mars have shown potential signs of past life on the Red Planet. She also noted that NASA’s Ingenuity Mars Helicopter has completed more than 70 flights on Mars since 2021.
