Indian space agency has started preparations for the landing of the Chandrayaan-3 station on the moon on August 23 just days after a similar Russian probe crashed into the lunar surface.

India’s descent module, consisting of the Vikram lander and the Pragyan rover, is expected to land on the lunar surface on the evening of August 23.

If successful, India will be only the fourth country to achieve a soft landing on the Moon, after the US, the former Soviet Union and China.

The fact that India could succeed after Russia failed would be a blow to President Vladimir Putin, who uses Russia's achievements in space as an integral part of his power.

The rocket carrying the Chandrayaan-3 took off on the moon in July from the Sriharikota space centre in India to roars of "Bharat Mata ki jai [Victory to mother India]" from spectators.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi said Chandrayaan-3 had "scripted a new chapter in India's space odyssey".

"It soars high, elevating the dreams and ambitions of every Indian. This momentous achievement is a testament to our scientists' relentless dedication. I salute their spirit and ingenuity!" he wrote on Twitter.

This will  be India’s third attempt to land a spacecraft on the moon and comes 13 years after the country's first Moon mission in 2008.

The last attempt was the Chandrayaan-2 - which also comprised an orbiter, a lander and a rover which was launched in July 2019. However, it was only partially successful. The orbiter continues to circle the Moon  and is still functional, but the lander-rover failed to make a soft landing and crashed during touchdown.

The attempt by India to land a vehicle on the moon, its second attempt, comes only days after Russia’s Luna-25 robo-probe crashed into the moon after controllers at Russian space agency Roscosmos lost control of it on August 20, the agency reported on August 20.

Russia launched the probe that was supposed to spend a year gathering data on the moon on August 11, the first moon mission in nearly 50 years and the first domestically made probe in modern Russia’s history.

The unmanned robotic lander went into an “uncontrolled orbit and subsequently crashed,” Russia's space corporation Roscosmos said.

"The apparatus moved into an unpredictable orbit and ceased to exist as a result of a collision with the surface of the Moon," it said in a statement.

The Luna 25 would have been the first space vehicle to explore the moon’s south polar region. The Chandrayaan-3 is also headed to the south polar regions. If all goes well, its six-wheeled rover will then roam around the region on the Moon's surface, gathering data and look for water that is believed to be in the region.

The surface area in the south that remains in shadow there is much larger than that of the Moon's north pole, which means there is a possibility of water in areas that are permanently shadowed