The Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO), which is tinkering with a rocket engine for its glitch-ridden Geosynchronous Satellite Launch Vehicle (GSLV) project, says an unmanned lunar mission could be launched by 2008.

ISRO spokesman S. Krishnamurti, however, said the agency had yet to receive a green light from the government.

"There is no approved project. However, some preliminary discussions have taken place between ISRO engineers and Indian scientists on the feasibility of a lunar mission," the spokesman said.

Studies on a possible rocket have focused on the Polar Satellite Launch Vehicle (PSLV), which is already capable of carrying a 1,250-kilogram (2,750-pound) payload 1,000 kilometers (620 miles) above the earth.

"A lunar mission can provide impetus to science in India, a challenge to technology and, possibly, a new dimension to international cooperation," said an upbeat ISRO Chairman K. Kastururangan.

"It can also serve as a test bed for future missions which could be undertaken by India to explore outer space in the new millenium."

Indian scientists have been debating the voyage since 1997 and last October they held their first public brainstorming session on "scientific objectives, trajectories, conceptualisation of spacecraft and the capability of Indian launch vehicles to undertake the mission," an ISRO source said.

Spokesman Krishnamurti said either of India's two launch vehicles could be modified to reach the moon's orbit, but scientists who have worked with the rockets sounded a note of caution.

"It would be a tall order," said a former senior ISRO systems scientist who had worked on the GSLV -- a rocket designed to put a 2,000-kilogram (4,400-pound) satellite some 36,000 kilometres (22,320 miles) in space.

The national agency has put into orbit five communications satellites, four remote-sensing satellites and three experimental satellites in the past 25 years.

Most of them rode piggyback on either Russian or French satellite launch vehicles -- a trend that continued after the PSLV's maiden flight in 1994 met a watery end in the sea.

ISRO, however, took its first step towards the multi-billion-dollar commercial satellite launch market in May 26, 1999 when a PSLV carried a South Korean and a German satellite into orbit.

The GSLV was slated to take-off last year, but a glitch in its locally-built engine in February forced the agency to postpone testing of the deep space rocket until 2001.

"The lunar mission is a deviation from the ISRO's original vision of an application-driven approach for grass-root beneficiaries, and hence it is not geared to undertake a task of such dimensions," said the former systems scientistsm who declined to be identified.

"The organisation is still struggling with the GSLV and its success is now dependent on the supply of Russian cryogenic engines.

"The question is also not whether the PSLV or the GSLV can reach the moon but their capacity to re-enter earth's atmosphere. So, it would be just wise to keep our feet planted on earth for the time being," he added.

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