Nair, who led India’s first lunar orbiter mission -- Chandrayaan-1 -- was inducted by BJP National President Amit Shah
Terming the manned mission as the next logical step for India's space programme, Nair praised Prime Minister Narendra Modi for mentioning the mission.
"Time has come to go for second green revolution. What tools we use...whether it's genetically modified seeds or new methods of fertilisations or even water management..all these are issues before us. There, maximum thrust has to go in," the former ISRO chairman said.
The former Indian Space Research Organisation chairman said he had mentioned a couple of years ago that the so-called IT boom would go bust and "that is the phenomena we are now seeing".
ISRO's commercial arm Antrix had cancelled a deal involving use of two satellites and a spectrum after which Devas Multimedia filed the case against the former.
ISRO has declined to give details of its correspondence with former space agency chief G Madhavan Nair on the report of a high-level probe into the Antrix-Devas deal on the basis of which he and three others were barred by government from any re-employment.
Slamming the action against four space scientists over the Antrix-Devas deal without giving them a chance to defend themselves, former ISRO chief Prof U R Rao today described it as "ridiculous" and indicated it might impact decision-making process at the space agency.
The government has showed signs of blinking in the stand-off with former ISRO scientists. Sources have told CNN-IBN that the government will speak to Madhavan Nair and the other 3 former ISRO scientists soon.