August 7, 2007 (LPAC)--Indian opposition to the just-concluded India-US nuclear deal has increased markedly over recent days. The two objections are: 1) that it would undermine India's planned thorium reactor program; and 2) that India's program would depend upon a 40-year strategic bond with an "unreliable" United States.

India is rich in thorium, and intends to use it to create a self-sufficient program of peaceful nuclear energy. The thorium cycle is of intense interest worldwide because it does not allow diversion to military uses.

The nuclear agreement, as it stands now, is not effective without the blessing of the U.S. Congress. The bill is not expected on the Hill before December, but the concerns among the Indian scientists, politicians and strategists, are that the agreement reached undermines India's somewhat unique thorium reactor program, by not ensuring production of adequate amount of plutonium for the purpose of launching a long-term and broad-based thorium reactor-based nuclear power generation program.

In an open letter addressed to the Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, former Indian premier V.P. Singh brought this issue to the front and said "India should have the right to stockpile nuclear fuel and reprocess it; this should neither delay nor jeopardize the indigenous thorium-based fast breeder program." Earlier, the main opposition party in the Parliament, the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) made clear its opposition to the agreement and demanded a full discussion and vote in parliament, which the government would have preferred to avoid. In addition, the recent announcement by India's Left coalition, which supports the Congress party-led UPA government, that it would oppose the nuclear agreement in the Parliament, could mean sinking of the deal by the Indians.