Mysuru's tilted LED-dome planetarium, built over four years, to open on November 13

Prime Minister Narendra Modi is due to inaugurate India’s first LED-dome planetarium in Mysuru on Friday, November 13, after 3 pm, according to Mysuru-Kodagu MP Yaduveer Krishnadatta Chamaraja Wadiyar, who announced the programme at a press conference on November 9. The Cosmology Education and Research Training Centre, known as COSMOS, stands on the University of Mysore campus at the foot of Chamundi Hill and is managed by the Indian Institute of Astrophysics (IIA), Bengaluru.

The planetarium forms the last stop of the Prime Minister’s Karnataka visit, which also takes in the Bengaluru Pink Line metro and a Vande Bharat flag-off. Our preview of the two-day tour has the full schedule.

What visitors will see

A conventional planetarium throws an image from projectors onto a white dome. COSMOS has no projector at all. Its 15-metre dome is tilted at 15 degrees and lined with LED panels that a computer drives directly, so the show appears on the dome surface itself. The IIA says the system gives 8K resolution and far better contrast than projection, which matters most for a dark night sky with bright stars.

The dome seats about 150 people at a time. The control software is called SkyExplorer, developed by France-based RSA Cosmos with Japan’s Konica Minolta, according to local reports. The IIA says only two public installations of this type exist, both in Japan, and that Mysuru would be the first tilted one supplied to an independent customer. The organisers call it the world’s first of its kind, a claim that rests on their own description of the technology.

Yaduveer said two to three shows will run each day for students and tourists, with entry tickets for tourists, and that the centre expects about five lakh visitors a year, similar to the Bengaluru planetarium. He called it “a major addition to the city’s educational, scientific and tourism infrastructure”. Ticket prices have not been announced.

The building has classrooms and training rooms as well as the dome. The IIA says the dome will also be used to display data from Indian telescopes, and it wants to run astronomy outreach in Kannada and in rural Karnataka. An earlier report said the centre would serve more than 200 educational institutions.

How it took four years

Union Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman laid the foundation stone on March 6, 2022. She gave ₹5 crore from her MPLADS funds, and the Department of Science and Technology, the Department of Atomic Energy and the Department of Space also backed the project. The Principal Scientific Advisor to the Government of India steers it. The University of Mysore gave about three acres of land.

COSMOS planetarium

1. March 6, 2022Sitharaman lays the foundation stone
2. November 2024Sitharaman reviews progress; completion expected in about 10 months
3. September 2025Opening target, as reported in December 2024
4. January 13, 2026Civil works done; opening expected in February 2026
5. November 13, 2026Prime Minister due to inaugurate

The opening date moved more than once. Reports in December 2024 pointed to September 2025, and in January 2026 the University of Mysore’s Vice-Chancellor, Prof N K Lokanath, said civil works were complete and the facility was expected to open “next month”. Interior work and equipment installation were then going on “at full speed”, he said. February passed without an inauguration.

What it cost

The price depends on who is asked. Reports in January 2026 put it at about ₹85 crore, others at an estimated ₹91 crore, and the MP’s figure on November 9 was ₹115 crore. The sums come from several Union departments, the Swadesh Darshan tourism scheme and MPLADS funds. The IIA’s project page does not give a figure, so the final bill is not confirmed.

What happens next

The inauguration is to be followed by an address from the Prime Minister at the venue, which holds about 10,000 people. The district administration will decide how entry passes are shared. The date from which the public can buy tickets has not been announced. Until the dome opens, the IIA has been running astronomy education programmes in Mysuru and nearby areas, which it plans to continue with the planetarium as its base.