The country's first lunar mission would be accomplished within five years, Indian Space Research Organisation's new acting chairman G Madhavan Nair said on Wednesday.

In his first interaction with reporters in Thiruvananthapuram after taking over as ISRO chief, Nair said, "We will have our spacecraft orbiting around the moon in the next five years."

The design activities and experiments for the mission were going on and the ISRO had got necessary approvals from the Union government for the project, he said.

Nair said two engines for the mission had been tested and the stage tests were getting along. The cryogenic tests would be carried out very soon.

The educational satellite 'edusat' would be launched next year providing links between IITs, Indian Institute of Science and major educational institutions, he said.    

"Tele-education is also coming in a big way and there are demands from different states including Jharkhand. A host of application programmes have been initiated in this field," he said.           

The application of telemedicine technology was part of ISRO's plans to use space technology for the benefit of common man. The services of major hospitals could be made available to inaccessible areas through the project, he said.

Nair said the country could launch heavy lift launch vehicles with additional payload capacity in the next two years. "What we have done in the last 25 years we will be doing in the next five years," he said.

The commercial market for launch vehicle is now highly competitive as European markets were offering facilities at cheaper rates, he said. "There is cut-throat competition in the field, but we are trying." he said.

ISRO had put more than 100 transponders in the orbit but the demand was likely to double in the next two years.

Nair said the ISRO was planning to undertake an unmanned space mission. On the Columbia disaster, he said, "We will be able to learn from mistakes."