I have been watching the news and discussions on the Indian national TV networks about the imminent arrival of President Bush to India. Completely peppered with discussions on the Civilian nuclear energy deal, there is no dearth of analysts with opinions.
However, I wanted to hear it from the horses mouth. So I turned on the Doordarshan channel telecasting the Rajya Sabha proceedings where the Prime Minister was making a statement on the progress of the deal with the United States. Unfortunately, I couldnt make out a word of what the PM was saying. So I turned to the proceedings of the Lok Sabha where the PM was making the same statement after finishing off at the Rajya Sabha. No luck there.
Fortunately, the newspapers next day carried the PM's statement. So I went over it once again. Reading it line by line to find out why according to the PM's "enlightened" national interest should India be inking this hyped deal.
Nothing. Absolutely nothing. The statement was as general and vanilla as possible. The only possible essence I could gather from the PM's text was that he did not want India to miss this historic opportunity to get back onto the nuclear mainstream after so many years in the wilderness. Apparently, the government believed that India's nuclear winter was about to get over.
To be honest, I had earlier come across similar sentiments expressed by one of our leading strategic experts Mr K Subramanyam in one of his earlier columns. But my key question is what is it that India will get once it becomes part of the mainstream.
In chorus they say - civilian nuclear technology. Oh well ! thats a no-brainer. But what, pray, may I know will we do with this technology.
I was hoping the Prime Minister would tell the "august house" and through them the country the merits of such a deal. Instead of the wishy-washy words, I was hoping to get some information on the concrete advantages that would accrue to India.
The Hindu news daily carried an opinion piece that talked about exactly this. France's 75 % energy needs is presently being fulfilled by its nuclear power industry. So may be the Indian government was looking to emulate such a strategy. However, calculated the author, the amount of power energy that would be generated using imported nuclear fuel and technology would be miniscule even when extrapolated to year 2050, that it absolutely does not make sense to go through so much trouble to ink this deal.
The advantage, says the author, is for the americans who are looking to revive their dormant nuclear energy industry and also to get a fresh influx of new talent in the form of the Indian scientific establishment.
If this were true, then I would believe that India's scientific and nuclear establishment would become an important part of any future nuclear advancements and inventions. This looks very tempting. Usage of such advancements in space exploration, and other fields would be tremendous.
However, I am still waiting for the government to come up with the clinching arguement that would slam shut the case. The american president is arriving tomorrow and I am still waiting.
Needless to say, I am not going to sway either way based on some anti-americanism that so much plagues the leftists, muslim groups and other interest groups in our country. The same Hindu news daily carried the opinion of Arundhati Roy. With all due respect, the opinion piece lacked substance though it was high on English. Judge for yourself, though.
The american involvement in Iraq or the so called imperialistic designs that colours all analysis made out by some political interest groups in India, is not going to guide my opinion on this issue.
Its Supreme National Interest, nothing else.
Will the Prime Minister please enlighten us ?
3 comments:
Superb write-up as always.
Only thing I can find fault with this write-up is that you are too patriotic ;-)
You are right in telling that Arundhati Roy was talking in a moronish manner. I had earlier read Arundhati Roy's other articles and thought she was brilliant not just the command over language, but the quality of thoughts she reverberates.
Anyway, I think the answer lies in accepting the superiority of Americans or Westerners in this technology and minimise the time in which India could gain win energy-security battle. I think the profit we are about to gain through this will really push India into major league.
Her article on bigger dams titled 'The Greater Common Good' was quite classy. Guess, she will soon compare Manmohan Singh with Nehru i.e for disrespecting the aspirations of common man and blindly moving towards future-growth.
Eshwar
IMHO, your writing is much more original and wonderful than many of those opinionated MSM editorial.
Funny thing is ,He enjoys much more support from India and Indians then other countries in the world, the approval rate is around 54% acccording to HT.
Sancho...thanks. Though I quite dont understand your faulty patriotism thingy !??
And as for Ms.Roy, I had no opinion of her until I read that opinion piece. To put it mildly it was full of utter nonsense.
Ganesh ji....I am flattered. Thanks for the encouragement. You are being very kind though.
I did come across that piece of stats..amazing isnt it !!
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