The NASA-ISRO Synthetic Aperture Radar (NISAR) satellite, launched on July 30, 2025 aboard ISRO's GSLV-F16 rocket from Satish Dhawan Space Centre in Sriharikota, was declared fully operational in January 2026 and has been delivering landmark science data since. As of April 2026, NISAR has completed its initial calibration phase and is producing detailed Earth observation data across multiple continents, demonstrating the capabilities of its dual-frequency Synthetic Aperture Radar (SAR) payload.\n\nNISAR is the first satellite mission to use two different radar frequencies — L-band (provided by NASA-JPL) and S-band (provided by ISRO) — to measure changes in Earth's surface as small as 1 cm. This allows scientists to monitor crustal deformation from earthquakes, volcanic activity, glacial movement, land subsidence, and agricultural changes with unprecedented precision.\n\nIn March 2026, NISAR made detailed observations of vegetation and surface deformation around Mount Rainier and Mount St. Helens in the US Pacific Northwest, as well as the cities of Seattle and Portland. The mission has a 12-day repeat cycle covering the entire globe, providing continuous environmental monitoring.\n\nParliament was also informed in April 2026 (through a PIB update) that ISRO's PSLV, which experienced an anomaly in a recent mission, is undergoing review by a national expert committee before returning to flight. PSLV is critical to India's small satellite launch economy and multiple upcoming missions.\n\nNISAR represents the largest-ever bilateral space collaboration between India and the United States, with a combined development cost of approximately $1.5 billion. It is central to India's growing stature in global space science and relevant to RAS topics of science policy, international cooperation, and space technology applications in disaster management and agriculture.