The cost, estimated at Rs 450 crore, was, however, likely to go up further by the time of the launch, Chandrayaan-I executive director M Annadurai said here.

Delivering the keynote address at the convocation of the Marudhur Kesari Jain college here, he said that the youth could achieve expertise in their chosen fields and come out with successful inventions if they worked hard.

"We have 40 lakh youth in the country. If all of them, put together, work tirelessly, India will be a force to reckon with by 2020, as former President A P J Abdul Kalam has already predicted," he said.

Annadurai pointed to the example of ISRO engineers and scientists, who he said, had after years of hard work and some failures, successfully launched satellites.

District Collector Rajendran, who was present, handed out degree certificates to 229 candidates of the college.

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