By NNN-IRNA,
New Delhi : Hoping that differences on the issue of Indo-US civilian nuclear deal would be sorted out sooner than later, enabling India to step up nuclear power generation, India’s Atomic Energy Commission Chairman noted that the Indo-US civilian nuclear deal is “more of a problem of politics”.
“It is more a problem of politics. I won’t be in a position to answer that question,” he said in reply to a query on when he expects to clinch the deal.
Asked if more needs to be achieved on the safeguards with the global nuclear watchdog, IAEA, Kakodkar said to a private TV channel, “nothing is final till everything is final and everything is obviously not final.”
The top nuclear scientist said he “only hoped that things (related to the nuclear deal) work out sooner than later.”
Kakodkar said he would be able to accelerate the domestic programme to produce nuclear power if he got “inputs from outside.” “In any case, the domestic efforts are on and we hope to meet the domestic program needs on the basis of domestic strengths. If external inputs are available so much the better,” he said.
Asked whether the stalemate on the deal was affecting the domestic programme, Kakodkar said, “the fact is the domestic programme was 10,000 MW. The question is what rate I will be able to produce it and how fast. If we get inputs from outside we can do that much faster.”