Bengaluru (Karnataka) [India], November 30 (ANI): Karnataka Congress president DK Shivakumar has written a letter to Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Karnataka Chief Minister Basavaraj S Bommai appealing that the Indian Space Research Organisation's (ISRO) Indian Human Space Flight Programme should not be shifted out from Karnataka to Gujarat as people of the state will feel "betrayed' and "it will have serious repercussions".

"They (People of Karnataka) are aghast and severely jolted to learn that there are attempts to shift this prestigious project - The Indian Human Space Flight programme- from Bengaluru to Gujarat. If it happens, the people of the state will feel that the Federal Government at the Centre is ignoring, betraying and giving scant respect to the feelings of Kannadigas," reads the letter tweeted by Shivakumar.

"It will hurt the self-respect and emotional sentiments of Kannadigas very severly. The move will have an adverse effect on consolidation of the federal system in the country. When the people of one part of the nation start feeling that they are being "betrayed", it will have serious repercussions," it added.

As per the letter, ISRO headquartered in Bengaluru had initiated the Indian Human Space Flight programme in 2007 to develop the technology needed to launch a crew-based orbital spacecraft into low-earth orbit as part of the ambitious 'Ganganyaan' project.

The agency then planned its first crew-based flight in 2023 on an indigenous GSLV rocket. When completed on schedule, India will become the world's only fourth nation to undertake such a prestigious programme after the US, Soviet Union and China (ANI)