By Xinhua,
New Delhi : India’s senior scientists Tuesday expressed their strong opposition against the Indian government seeking the IAEA Board approval on the safeguards agreement before debating it within the United Progressive Alliance and Left Committee, according to NDTV.
“We are strongly of the opinion that the Government should not proceed to seek IAEA Board approval for the current draft safeguards agreement, until its implications are debated more fully within the country, or at least within the UPA-Left Committee,” said a joint statement issued by the senior scientists, when the Congress Party-led coalition government has been grappling with the nuclear deal issue.
The senior scientists are P. K. Iyengar, former chairman of Atomic Energy Commission, A. Gopalakrishnan, former head of Atomic Energy Regulatory Board and A. N. Prasad, former Director of Bhabha Atomic Research Center.
“The agreement should also be discussed with a group of experts who are not party to the IAEA negotiations,” they said in the statement.
They pointed out that there is a great deal of disquiet among the scientific community at large at “this critical juncture” when the government is about to rush the safeguards agreement to the IAEA without giving its details to the UPA-Left Committee created specifically for a joint evaluation of the deal.”