Re: India’s mars mission countdown…
Read the part about ‘rest of the country’. For poor countries like India, Pakistan etc. the way to become prosperous is to create more ways of making money. For China in the 90s, it was manufacturing. For Taiwan and Japan in 80s it was electronics. For India it is high technology & services. It will benefit mankind, unless you think that people in India are not part of mankind.
Also, I only made the financial case for it. Am sure one can make a religious one ( lets wait for Bao Bihari’s response on it ) or even a scientific/technological one.