India, July 20 -- India entered a new era of commercial spaceflight on Saturday after Skyroot Aerospace's Vikram-1 became the country's first privately developed rocket to reach orbit. In an interview that aired on the same day, the founder of Skyroot, Pawan Kumar Chandana, recalled how he chose to take up a job at the Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) rather than opt for a higher-paying private sector job.

Pawan Kumar Chandana is the co-founder and chief executive officer of Hyderabad-based Skyroot Aerospace. An IIT Kharagpur alumnus, he was recruited by ISRO directly from the campus in 2012 and worked at the space agency for nearly six years before leaving to pursue his entrepreneurial ambitions.

Chandana co-founded Skyroot Ae...