ABSTRACT
We are playing a lead role
for growth of astronomy and its quality teaching and research in Manipur, a State located at
northeast India (longitude = 93°58'E; latitude = 24°44'N; altitude = 782 m). We
have innovatively designed and constructed three cost effective observatories,
each costing a few hundred USD. These observatories are completely different in
design and are perfectly usable for doing serious work on astronomical
observation and measurements, using small ground-based telescopes. One
Celestron CGE1400 telescope is housed with equatorial mounting in one of three
constructed observatories and the same observatory has been inducted, since
January 2012, as one of the members of the “Orion Project”, which is an
international project headquartered at Phoenix, Arizona, USA, dedicated for
photometric and spectroscopic observations of five bright variable stars of the
Orion constellation. We have been producing high precision BVRI photometric
data that match well with those produced by other observatories enrolled in the
Orion project. Our photometric data were presented and discussed in the 33rd
Annual Conference of the Society for Astronomical Sciences: Symposium on
Telescope Science, held at Ontario, California, USA during June 12 - 14, 2014.
Further, we could successfully demonstrate them to the entire population of the
State and play live shows of the observation of three spectacular astronomical
events namely, solar eclipse of
15th January 2010, lunar eclipse
of 10th December 2011 and Transit
of Venus of June 6, 2012. We have conducted a number of seminars and workshops
for training and research in astronomy. In
the present paper, we would like describe our self-built observatories, our
observational facilities, the BVRI photometric data that we acquired for the
Orion project, and other activities undertaken for growth of astronomy
activities in the State of Manipur, India.