Why Pluto holds a special place in our hearts and solar system

It was 1am and I was waiting with a group of young people in the centre of a grassy lawn, located at the centre of the universe. Well, at least that patch of grass seemed like the centre of the universe. Because this was where amazing, cavernous, vaguely untouchable telescopes were set up. These would be our eyes in the skies. These were what we had been waiting hours for, to be calibrated, pointed, and pirouetted — granting us breathless access to planets, planet-rings, dreams and moons in the sky. All the kids there had a certain glassy-eyed look which parents recognise universally: that look when it's really past your bedtime, and you just can't keep your eyes open; but overdosed on adrenaline, you really can't shut your eyes.

Thank god for Delhi's Nehru Planetarium, that open-hearted, open-armed place where kids — and kids above 18 — can gather and look at the sky. After waiting in serpentine lines, I would get a chance to see the rings of Saturn, and sometimes, the moons of Jupiter. It was three or four hours well spent, in the company of adults who knew every star in the balmy sky, and others who knew nearly nothing. A little over four hours is also what it takes New Horizons, the NASA spacecraft, to send us images from Pluto, and its moons. For the first time, we have been able to really see the planet that's not really a planet, the edge of the solar system.

I thought Pluto would be many things, but "pink" was not one of them. The incredible photos New Horizon has sent are another reminder of childhood: Pluto, I thought, looks like a tennis ball, when the fuzzy green layer peels off. It's the salmon-pink rubber ball which is testimonial to many, many afternoons of cricket, sometimes played, admittedly, with a plastic bat. (There was always also the option of playing with a plastic ball, but that was turned down in favour of the more dangerous, and infinitely more unexpected-delivering wallops, black eyes and bumps-tennis rubber balls.) For a second then, this precious look at Pluto was devoured as a giddy rush into childhood.

Pluto has a place in collective hearts, perhaps like none other in the Milky Way. After being known as a planet for years, Pluto was "demoted" to "dwarf planet". To this day, astro-physicist Neil DeGrasse Tyson gets hate for declaring that Pluto is not really a planet (also dubbed "the Death of Pluto":

A small body at the edge of the solar system, Pluto — named after the God of the Underworld — has debates around it, which are like signs of defiance and fierce emotion at the vast, uncaring universe. It's like naming tigers-christening them Macchli, Sundari or Ustad (all from Ranthambore legend), or Shivaji (from Tadoba) in India. The tiger doesn't really care what name we give it, (and like a far-away planet, doesn't even know it!) but we recognise and admire our favoured subjectwith devotion, giving it a name that acquires meaning, strength, familiarity. Similarly, whether we call Pluto a planet or not, means little to its actual existence. But space-enthusiasts are still passionate about Pluto's rights, so to speak. New Mexico for instance has declared, by law, that Pluto will always be considered a planet, and March 13 is Pluto day.

Now with so much more revealed about Pluto (and there's more to come) there are also attempts to name features on the planet. An icy ridge of mountains found on the surface will be named after Nepali Sherpa Tenzing Norgay. And it is perhaps fitting that other unveiled features will have more enigmatic names, stolen from imagination and magic: in the running is Balrog, that twisted, frightening fire-creature that killed wizard Gandalf in the magical The Lord of the Rings. Other dwarf planets too exist in our solar system: there are Haumea, Ceres, Makemake and Eris. You may not even have heard of them.

Because in the emerging narrative of neighbourhood space travel, there's really none quite like Pluto. Icy Pluto, like a good vigilante or a dashing Robin Hood, always holds our imagination-and sometimes, our sympathy.

I think what sums it up was a visit to the National Museum of Natural History a few years ago. Pluto had freshly been demoted from planetary status. While the world gnashed their teeth about this astro-geographical phenomena, and curriculum writers thought about changing science textbooks ("Our solar system has nine planets") and holiday homework ("make a chart on the solar system's planets), I was at the museum.

Stopping at the solar system exhibit on the first floor, I spotted a little ball at the edge of our solar system. "Pluto's there, Pluto's there," I squealed, grabbing my friend's bicep. "Pluto is still part of the solar system!"