Rifath Shaarook is an youngster, who invented the world's smallest satellite 'KalamSat'. The 4 cm cubic satellite weighed only 64 grams. The satellite was launched by NASA at Wallops flight facility - Virginia on June 22, 2017.
Rifath Sharook has been an internet sensation ever since the national and international media recognized his contribution to space technology. After learning about him, I shared the idea of meeting him with my friend Koushik. Koushik and I planned to document a story for Pragati Bimba.
We contacted him over the phone. He took some time to know what was our intention and invited us to meet him on a fine day.
I decided to go with Koushik’s idea as he is a better technician. As we began our conversation Rifath, he began sharing his stories. He told how his father who was also doing independent research on astronomy inspired him to do space research.
Photo: Rifath on the right of me and Koushik on the left.
Shaarook belongs to a middle-class Muslim family in Karur. He was in school when his father passed away. It is only his mother who has been taking care of him since then. The youngster has been educating himself about space technology through google. Our conversation with him went on and on when Rifath told us something interesting about launching their first satellite using a big balloon.
He told us how a bunch of school kids pulled off a successful space project. Koushik finalized this one and prepared the plan, and we decided to shoot this in the school where Rifath studied. It was evening, and we were losing light already. We hurried to the spot. Rifath took permission from the school authorities. We finished our video before it was dark.
We went back to Rifath’s home. It was Ramadan month, and his family was observing fast. His mother offered us snacks and refreshments. We had to leave as it was getting late for us to return to our campus and thus came to an end our pleasant first time meeting with a scientist.
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