LUCKNOW, Aug. 26 -- Astronaut and Indian Air Force Group Captain Shubhanshu Shukla on Monday urged students to strive for the vision of landing on the moon by 2040, and in a lighter vein, warned them they may have "competition" in store for the coveted spots on the crewed mission. "I am going to be in competition!...so work hard and we will compete together. Let's see who goes to the Moon in 2040," he said, eliciting peals of laughter from the young crowd at his alma mater, City Montessori School (CMS) in Lucknow. He addressed more than 2500 students and answered queries of a few of them. The astronaut was joined by his father, Shambhu Shukla and mother, Asha Shukla, on the stage. His wife, son and in-laws were also present when he was felicitated. Shukla reached his hometown in the morning for the first time since his historic AXIOM 4 space mission. Though he arrived in India from the US on August 17, he visited the UP capital now after participating in multiple outreach events, including a meeting with Prime Minister Narendra Modi on August 18 in Delhi. He also met UP chief minister Yogi Adityanath at the latter's residence. The second Indian to reach space, Shukla received a grand welcome from students during a road show in the city. Students welcomed the astronaut to his hometown in Lucknow by waving the Tricolour and cheered for him. Visibly moved by the warm welcome in Lucknow, Shukla said with a smile: "I must have clicked about 2,000 selfies since I landed in Lucknow around 7:30 this morning. The famous saying, 'muskuraiye, aap Lucknow mein hain' (smile, you're in Lucknow) truly came alive for me today." "I received a welcome when I landed in Delhi, but the warmth of Lucknowites took my heart. I was tired when I landed, but seeing so many students on both sides of the road sweating, smiling and so excited vanished my tiredness..." said Shukla. "The entire landscape is changing, and I think the future is extremely bright," Shukla said addressing the gathering at his school, stressing that it was perseverance that defined his success. "As a student, I also participated in such events, but it was a different feeling today. I did not like these parades then, but today when I saw students standing for me, I did not see anybody with a feeling of despair on their face. I never gave an exceptional performance like these students did. In that sense I was not that talented, but I reached heights. Seeing them, I could only wonder where they will reach one day with such talent - all you need is perseverance. I learnt perseverance from CMS," said Shukla. "After intense training when we reached outer space, the environment changed completely, requiring us to learn everything from moving around to speaking and doing different things. It took a few days to adapt once we reached there and it again took about 4-5 days to re-adapt to the Earth's atmosphere once we returned. At the time of landing, I felt heavy headed. It seemed we were hit with high intensity of gravity, but our meter showed it was only 0.3 gravitational force which made us realize the difference between zero gravity and slight changes while entering," he explained. The astronaut also shared various experiments he conducted during the mission, including one in which he had to stand with a fan behind him for over three hours while sticking to the wall, growing microgreens. "I carried out seven experiments and all these were meant to understand how we can make our life better on Earth. During the mission, we also faced two challenges - when a fire alarm rang at the space station, which was fortunately a false one, and when a warning of an obstacle progressing near the capsule was issued, but it did not happen," he said. Shukla said he believes it is a "golden time" for space missions and he is amazed by the capability of the new generation. The astronaut also stressed the importance of the spirit not to give in. In a lighter vein, he said this spirit was exhibited by how the school's manager, Geeta Gandhi Kingdon, pursued defence minister Rajnath Singh to ensure that Shukla comes to his hometown soon after his return from the space mission....