Meteorites, the extraterrestrial rock pieces, arrive from parts of the solar system packed with wealth of information on the creation of our mother earth and the solar system as well.Since inception of the Geological Survey of India, Thomas Oldham, the founder Director, took interest in collection of meteorites from the private collectors and displayed in the gallery of Indian Museum in Calcutta. He also started systematic cataloguing the meteorites. GSI is the authorized curator and repository of all the meteorites fall on the Indian soil and presently possesses about 700 meteorites of different kinds.
Geological Survey of India has been the sole custodian for all meteorite “falls” or “finds” within Indian Territory and it has conserved the Indian meteorites for scientific researches as well as for posterity.. Each milligram of meteorite sample is invaluable, as the answer to the very question of “our origin” perhaps lies within such meteorites. Every meteorite is, to a great extent, unique in its own way and demands extreme urgency and awareness in matters of collection and proper preservation.
The virtual museum exhibits 105 number of different kinds of meteorites of Indian origin as well as 384 number of unique meteorites collected from all over the world. They are well preserved in the Meteorite Repository of Geological Survey of India and are an invaluable asset of our country.