New Delhi [India], March 18 (ANI): Union Minister Jitendra Singh Tuesday called NASA astronaut Sunita Williams a 'daughter of India' as the world awaits her return alongwith Butch Wilmore, who have spent nearly nine months on the International Space Station.

Singh also stated that the country is 'proud' of her and praying for her safe return.

'...She (Sunita Williams), being a daughter of India, has made the entire world proud...She has successfully accomplished the task that she was assigned to. While all of us pray for a safe return, we also feel proud of her...A very pleasant coincidence is the fact that today itself, Prime Minister Modi made a statement on Maha Kumbh in the Parliament and incidentally, Sunita also expressed her best wishes for the Kumbh...,' Singh told ANI.

The Minister also referred to Sunita Williams' Indian roots in Gujarat and highlighted that Indian space scientists are making waves internationally.

'There is a very deep connection between her and India and of course Gujarat, the state that she belongs to. This is also an indication of the fact that most of the space agencies outside India, including NASA, are now having Indian boys and girls leading most of their important missions...,' the MoS said when asked about Prime Minister Narendra Modi's March 1 letter to Williams.

PM Modi in his letter mentioned that 1.4 billion Indians have always taken pride in her achievements, and he looks forward to her safe return home.

'I convey to you greetings from the people of India. At a programme today, I met the noted astronaut, Mr. Mike Massimino. During the course of our conversation, your name came up and we discussed how proud we are of you and your work. Following this interaction, I could not stop myself from writing to you,' PM Modi wrote in his letter to Sunita Williams.

NASA's Boeing Starliner astronauts Sunita 'Suni' Williams and Barry 'Butch' Wilmore, along with two others, have undocked from the International Space Station (ISS) and are scheduled to splash down on Earth Tuesday evening. Williams and Wilmore are accompanying SpaceX Crew 9 astronaut Nick Hague and Russian astronaut Alexander Gorbunov.

Willams and Wilmore were launched to the ISS on June 5, 2024 on a Boeing Starliner spacecraft, then stayed aboard the ISS after it developed technical issues. In September 2024, NASA sent the Starliner craft back to Earth, uncrewed, to free up the docking port for other spacecraft.

Now, after nine months Williams and Wilmore are set to return to Earth on the capsule of the Elon-Musk owned Space X.

As NASA went live, Nick Hague, Suni Williams, Butch Wilmore, and cosmonaut Aleksandr Gorbunov were seen packing up and closing the hatches as Crew9 prepared to depart from the Space Station.

'It's been a privilege to call the Space Station home, to play my part in its 25-year legacy of doing research for humanity, and to work with colleagues, now friends, from around the globe. My spaceflight career, like most, is full of the unexpected,' said Nick Hague.

The launch came after US President Donald Trump urged Elon Musk to rescue the stranded astronauts sooner than NASA had planned. He has repeatedly accused former US President Joe Biden of abandoning them in space. (ANI)