Nuclear (Not a Clear) Deal. Review on prime Time

Be it the stock market or Indian Ambasaddor to the US, every one seems to be affected by this deal - directly or otherwise. So, what is all the hype & hoopla about? If you expect the answers to this

question in the following write-up, I am sorry that you’d be disappointed. Please put in some time & Google for the details - if you’re so much interested in knowing it.

Presented below is my point of view of what the India Inc & Congress supporters apparently believe as Pros of the deal,

1. Energy Safety - I am told that Ambani’s & Tata’s power arm would be more than benefited by the deal and hence there is a strong lobby supporting this deal

   
   




2. Again Energy Safety - We’ve got numbers to confirm that a mere 3 or 5% of India’s total power generated is from Nuclear reactors. With this deal, this would jump to 20% in the next decade or so. It will rid Mumbai & Delhi of 10 hour long power cuts. It will provide power to the eternally in-the-dark Rural India.

   
   




3. Economic Ties - By accepting the deal India (read Tata’s, Ambani’s, Birla’s & Mittal’s) would be able to get its (or their) chunk of the "N-Commerce" cake.

   
   




4. Efforts down-the-drain - In a discussion on NDTV Profit, it was vehemently stated (by CII head-honcho & Bharti CEO, Mr. Mittal) that a lot of effort has gone into negotiations and if we back out now it would all go down the drain.

   
   




5. Global Image - If after so much negotiation, India backs out of the deal - it would tamper India’s image globally.

   
   




6. India vis-a-vis China - China took the N-route a few years back to manage its energy requirements & we should probably follow suit. This is the ’best’ way to obtain the technology & fuel required to that effect.

   
   




7. Trust - There is a claim that the deal would prove the amount of ’trust’ that has been developed between the 2 countries. Why not we look at proving this ’trust’ by NOT HAVING to be under the aegis of Hyde Act & Section 123 of Atomic Energy Act of the US Constitution.

   
   

Hmm.. I think thats enough of Pros. Let me be very very frank - firstly, I do not believe in Communism. I believe that leftist/communist thoughts would provide us with a more lazy population than anything else. If people are provided a Minimum Guarantee, they’d rather try and utilize that resource and avoid adding value to the economy. Having said that, I do not have faith in Capitalism either. Pure capitalism would be the biggest disaster - EVER. Even Charity would be done with a Profit motive. However, the chances of Capitalism doing good to the public is higher than Communism - WHY? Its more difficult for 100 people to be focus on a single goal that it is for 10 people. In capitalism even if a percentage of the rich & influential are ’good at heart’ and try to add value to the economy and expend efforts towards all-inclusive development, the economy (& its constituents) would be better-off. However, in communism 100 people (almost the entire country) would have to put efforts ’whole-heartedly’ to achieve the same goal - adding value & living better. This would prove ’obviously’ more difficult that the previous thought - or so I think.

So, why am I blabbering about Capitalism & Communism? Read on and you’ll understand why.

The following are the thoughts which I have been able to gather from Leftists & other sources which specify the cons of the deal

1. India taking up positions previously occupied by Afghanistan, Iraq & Pakistan (read becoming US’s pet dog - since Bush’s already got a cat named India) - Currently, we’ve got our own policy - be it with regards to Iran or our moratorium on further N-Testing. With this deal for the next 4 decades US would decide it on our behalf (to put it politely).

   
   




2. India’s policy decisions would be ’under Hyde Act & Atomic Energy Act of 1954 Section 123 of the US Constitution’ - Well, the entire negotiation is being carried out under the provision of the Hyde Act & the aforementioned section & act.

   
   




3. The biggest slur on the Indian Nuclear Scientist community,  yet - With all the (SC, ST, MBC, OBC, etc) reservations & big officers (read Babus) pulling strings, we still have a lot of (competent, read APJ Abdul Kalam like) people manning organizations like DRDO, ISRO, etc etc. For the love of God, the out-going president was himself a scientist. By subscribing to be a pet-dog to Uncle Sam, aren’t we undermining the competence of this community? Wish the JD (job description) was more readable and its lucrative value improved - so that the smart minds that are jumping from IIT to IIM to Franklin Templetons, Merrill Lynchs, Morgan Stanleys, Goldman Sachs, etc would rather attempt their hand at Nuclear Science.

   
   

Now, for my own 2-cents-worth on this topic,

1. Time-frame - Why should we get involved for FOUR decades under the aegis of this deal? I understand that building N-reactors and generating power aint something thats gonna happen in a few years; but wouldn’t it be ’smart’ for us to first have a ’trial’ run for say 10 or 15 years. Then, based on how things progress, we could continue or take other steps - as may be decided by the then Governent & situations.

   
   




2. Power - If the US has been open to ’even’ negotiate with India after so many decades - it in itself speaks volumes about our progress. I think we should work on this N-Commerce thing internally and not ’open it up’ like the Telecom sector. Lets first develop our own internal ’monoplistic’ organization (like we had BSNL) and then later expose it to competition. This method has worked so very well to our telecom sector, and it should do good for this one too. After all we could still manage without phones, but power is so much more important to us. Why should we open our market and allow foreign forces to be involved in the naesant stages. Once we reach a 10% N-power contribution to our total power generation, we could expose ourselves to foreign competition.

   
   

(continued on Comments section)