Hindus have urged teams competing for Google Lunar Xprize to carry Rig-Veda, world’s oldest religious text in continued use, to the moon.
Hindu statesman Rajan Zed, in a statement in Nevada (USA) today, said that sacred Rig-Veda, a revealed text of divine origin, was a universal treasure and it was highly important to preserve it on the surface of the moon.
Rajan Zed, who is President of Universal Society of Hinduism, pointed out that Rig-Veda transmitted eternal truth and was a storehouse of sacred knowledge covering a wide variety of topics like society, environment, nature of cosmos, mantric power, origins of the world, prayer, death, creation, etc.
In order to win Google Lunar Xprize, claimed to be the largest international incentive based prize of all time, “a private company must land safely on the surface of the Moon, travel 500 meters above, below, or on the Lunar surface, and send back two ‘Mooncasts’ to Earth”. Thirty-three teams are competing, including two from India—Synergy Moon and Team Indus. Filmmaker James Cameron, director of highest grossing Avatar, has endorsed it. Total prizes amount to $30 million, including the grand prize of $20 million.
A Bible was reportedly left behind on the lunar rover at moon’s surface during Apollo 15 mission in 1971 and efforts are being made to take Torah to the moon.
The Google Lunar XPRIZE (GLXP) sometimes referred to as Moon 2.0 is a space competition organized by the X Prize Foundation, and sponsored by Google. It was announced at the Wired Nextfest on 13 September 2007. The challenge calls for privately-funded spaceflight teams to compete to successfully launch a robotic spacecraft that can land and travel across the surface of the Moon while sending back to Earth specified images and other data.