Rajen Harshe and K.M.Seethi (eds.), Engaging with the World: Critical Reflections on India’s Foreign Policy (New Delhi: orient Longman, 2005)

India’s CTBT Policy: From ‘Text’ to ‘Testing Times’ K.M. Seethi South Asia has become a veritable powder keg after a series of nuclear tests conducted by India and Pakistan in May 1998. The Pokhran-II and Chagai tests escalated the tensions and conflicts in India-Pakistan relations, and accelerated the pace of nuclear arms spiral in the region. But the question of nuclearisation has been haunting the political communities in the subcontinent for more than three decades. The nuclear debate had acquired momentum when negotiations for a comprehensive test ban treaty (CTBT) reached a critical stage in the mid-1990s, particularly when India took a position in sharp contrast to its own tradition in fighting nuclear arms build-up across the world. For some time after Pokhran-II, it seemed as though the entire debate revolved round nuclear adventurism exhibited by India. As Pakistan too activated its programme through the Chagai tests, the debate soon shifted to the subject of India-Pakistan nuclear arms race. The unfolding scenario, in fact, presented a pathological obsession with nuclear arms and ballistic missiles. What did all this mean for the commoner in the subcontinent? The people of India and Pakistan celebrated the golden jubilee of their independence during 1997-98, and if the nuclear tests should be considered the logical consummation of fifty years of freedom, it would only amount to an exercise in ostentation, particularly when too many critical problems loomed large in the two countries in the post-cold war era. Critics said that the BJP has always been committed to a ‘hidden agenda’ behind its coalition parade. However, it has, without any inhibition, displayed its nuclear bravado in public view! The BJP has never tried to conceal its nuclear posture1 and, therefore, it is not surprising that the party has appropriated a convenient political space for its own advantages. Ironically, it is the ‘hidden agenda’ of the Indian state, as legitimised by the so-called secular parties that has been unveiled. One must see how Congress, the Janata Dal, and the left parties have responded to this. They accused the BJP-led government of making a sudden shift in India’s nuclear policy for its own partisan ends and saw no reason as to why the government should have undertaken the tests at that particular pint of time. And, in the same voice, they congratulated the Indian scientists on making the tests a great success. Some of them even said that the test of India’s nationalist fervour would have been proved more meaningfully and effectively had these explosions been carried out before by secular governments. The leftists in India were not different either. In the context of the CTBT debate, they supported the ‘hidden agenda’ of the Indian nuclear lobby without any reserve.2 As the debate was underway in India, the entire defence/strategic specialists whose views, in turn, have been reinforced by political parties, academics and the media in general, had wholly appropriated the intellectual space. Lack of expertise and information in defence-related subjects leads the general public to say that the defence specialists alone have the intellectual capacity and political privilege to engage in security discourses. The role of the Indian media has been equally sensitive. Very often, the media hype surpassed even

the basic limits of mature and balanced reporting/analysis. On the CTBT and nuclear adventurism, the media, in general, came in full support of the government position.3 Thus, the entire debate on the nuclear option and CTBT generated questions concerning the objectivity in assessment, on the one hand, and interpreting nationalism, national security, national pride, self-determination, anti-imperialism and sovereignty, on the other. India’s CTBT policy should, however, be placed within the broad spectrum of issues surrounding its nuclear programme with its history of more than half a century. It is true that not many people in India knew, until Pokhran-II, that India’s nuclear programme was also linked with defence research and development. A veil of secrecy had always been maintained over the entire nuclear establishment. This had invited criticism right at the beginning. Meghnad Saha, a celebrated nuclear scientist, had called the nuclear decision-making of India as ‘extremely retrograde’ (Sharma 1983). The secretive nuclear programme, which Saha referred to, got momentum after Homi J. Bhabha became chairman of the Atomic Energy Commission (AEC), which, in turn, was restructured granting extensive powers to him. The Atomic Energy Act of 1962 further strengthened the hands of Bhabha in sustaining this secretive programme. The Act restricted the disclosure of any information related to nuclear development activities (Sharma 1986: 5-17). The government was not obliged to reveal anything pertaining to this and even the amount being spent on nuclear development was not subject to official auditing. People were always kept in the dark and no public debate was encouraged on this subject until the CTBT question loomed large. Bhabha’s stature grew, over the years, under the guardianship of the Nehru government. Though Nehru never publicly supported military-oriented nuclear 4 programme, Bhabha was able to continue with the dual-purpose nuclear project (Government of India 1988; Abraham 1999; Perkovich 1999). A public pronouncement on this subject was, however, not possible because Nehru’s commitment to peace and nuclear disarmament always acted as a political check on Bhabha’s ambition (Government of India 1983b: 506-507). Yet, he made a statement in 1961 indicating that India could produce nuclear weapons in two years, if it so decided. In fact, the 1962 war with China and the Chinese nuclear explosion in 1964 provided the necessary political and strategic climate for contemplating weaponisation (Kapur 1976:193). Bhabha’s statement in 1964 favouring a nuclear deterrent strategy reflected the mood in the nuclear establishment. At a Pugwash Conference in Udaipur, he said that with the help of nuclear weapons “a state can acquire what we may call a position of absolute deterrence even against another having many times greater destructive power under its control.” Bhabha further said that “a country with a huge population, such as China, must always present a threat to its smaller neighbours, a threat they can only meet either by collective security or by recourse to nuclear weapons to redress the imbalance in size” (Bhabha 1964:75). The nuclear hawks seized the occasion to clamour for an aggressive militarisation programme for which the nuclear establishment would be a willing partner. As Bhabha got a subterranean nuclear explosion project (SNEP) sanctioned from the Shastri government in 1964-65, weapon-oriented research gained momentum and ever since the government has been committed to developing nuclear technology for military purposes. However, successive governments pursued a twopronged strategy of preaching a ‘peaceful nuclear development programme’ and

sustaining defence-oriented activities within the establishment. It was Vikram Sarabhai, successor of Bhabha, who, for the first time, designed a profile for atomic energy and space research keeping in view the development of advanced technology in these sectors for both peaceful and military purposes (Government of India 1970). In the meantime, India’s opposition to the nuclear non proliferation treaty (NPT) became more strident. Apart from questions relating to the discriminatory character of the treaty, paramount in its opposition to NPT was India’s ambition to develop nuclear weapons. In early 1970 India was determined to pursue an explosion policy. The May 1974 peaceful nuclear explosion (PNE) was the logical culmination of India’s ambitious nuclear programme for politico-security objectives (Government of India 1975; Kargil Review Committee 2000: 203). Even while India’s nuclear policy had shifted from ‘peaceful’ purposes to political and defence purposes, the policy-planners continued to argue that India would not produce nuclear weapons and that its commitment to disarmament and arms control has been quite genuine and consistent. Nonetheless, a powerful and influential bomb lobby in India had been asking for a more pronounced policy statement on India’s nuclear options. A number of factors provided impetus for this lobby’s campaign –Pakistan’s nuclear ambitions, Chinese nuclear superiority and the latter’s support to Islamabad’s nuclear development programmes. Meanwhile, within a few years, India demonstrated that it could produce weapon-grade plutonium. The first such plutonium capability research reactor was built near Mumbai. The Indian government had declared that any plutonium produced would not be used for nuclear weapons, but the fact was that it was used for the nuclear explosion devices. India had since constructed and was operating a large nuclear research reactor that had significant plutonium production potential. There were also other indications which showed that India was keen on developing nuclear weapons. The Kargil Review Committee’s report (2000: 199) acknowledged that the Indian nuclear programme was “weapon-oriented at least since 1983.” Alongside this, India initiated a missile development programme, and the testing of a number of missiles, including Agni I and II in the 1980s and 1990s, pointed to India’s ambition and capability in this field (Seethi 1997). Though successive governments dismissed allegations that the Agni missile was a nuclear weapon delivery system, the bomb lobby which desired the quick nuclearisation of India saw the Agni missile as a significant contribution to India’s negotiating strength. In the 1980s, the collaboration between the defence, nuclear and space establishments had gathered momentum and, consequently, the defence build-up in India began on a massive scale (Kargil Review Committee 2000: 165-68; Seethi 1993). The action-reaction spiral continued in the region with both India and Pakistan testing and developing new classes of missiles and other sophisticated weapons. The atmospheric tension seemed to be subsiding for a while in the late 1980s, but got further impetus in the 1990s with militarism of both India and Pakistan reaching a decisive stage. Towards a test ban regime

It may be noted that India was one of the first countries to make a proposal for a nuclear test ban treaty (Government of India 1988: 10). The proposal at that time was quite genuine and reflected the mood and sentiments of the national leadership on this question. In the 1950s, Nehru had called for negotiations for prohibition and elimination of nuclear weapons and, in the interim, a standstill agreement to halt nuclear testing (Nehru 1983: 195-201). It is true that Nehru’s proposal for a test ban was subsequently presented before the UN by India, and it strove hard to translate the proposal into reality. It is also true that all nuclear weapon powers were opposing a test ban treaty fearing that it would foreclose the possibility of developing and refining their nuclear weapons. They had strongly resisted such a test ban regime for forty years, defying at least eighty UN resolutions on this question. Yet, India continued its efforts at various levels to achieve complete nuclear disarmament, notwithstanding the fact that it too had sustained a weapon-oriented nuclear programme under the pretext of ‘peaceful’ research and development. India even signed the Partial Test Ban Treaty (PTBT) in 1963 knowing fully well that it was only ‘partial’ and that it did not put a ban on all types of nuclear tests and weapon development. However, over the years, a reorientation of India’s nuclear posture was well underway, particularly after 1974. The Kargil Review Committee’s Report (2000: 204) says that way back in 1983, Indira Gandhi had approved a nuclear test after discussions with Raja Ramanna, but it was abandoned due to US’ pressure. Yet, the subsequent governments continued to nurture the test option even while the nuclear ambiguity was the tactical choice of India. A.P.J. Abdul Kalam, then Scientific Adviser to the Defence Minister, in his discussions with the Kargil Review Committee indicated that “the nuclear programme was well under way in 1989. Development has been completed and weaponisation took place between 1992 and 1994.” Former Prime Minister Narasimha Rao also confirmed to the Committee that “the nuclear programme was fully weaponised during 1992-94” (Kargil Review Committee 2000: 205). However, the strategic landscape of the international system changed profoundly following the disintegration of the Soviet Union and other East European countries. In the early 1990s, the risk of nuclear war between the US and the Soviet Union (later Russia) seemed to have reduced with the end of cold war, but the nuclear weapon powers still felt concerned about the emergence of new nuclear weapons states, particularly in the Third World. The proposal for a test ban treaty was revived against this background. The nuclear weapon powers then began negotiations for a comprehensive test ban treaty, which they had opposed for more than four decades. It was in this context that India and the US co-sponsored a resolution to this effect in the UN during 1993-94. However, India had apparently made it clear before the US officials that “where India’s national security interests were involved, there could be no comprise, nor would we succumb to any external pressure” (Dixit 1996: 372). India, perhaps, did not anticipate that the test ban regime would become a reality given the fact that the nuclear weapon powers themselves had consistently opposed such a move. The dilemma for the Indian nuclear establishment and political leadership was that India was about to carry out nuclear tests and this would affect its nuclear posture in the global arena very badly. But leakage in the American press and subsequent American pressure on India again prevented the explosion project (Kargil Review Committee 2000: 205). Yet, the official perception was still in favour of a demonstration of India’s nuclear weapon capability. According to J.N.Dixit, the relevance of measured ambiguity

with respect to India’s nuclear weapons programme and missile capacity was coming to an end: “Just declaring that we have certain potentialities is not enough. We must provide concrete proof that our potentialities are not limited to conceptual claims and that our potentialities are, in fact, operational realities. Eventually the world at large will deal with us in terms of our proven capacities and strengths” (1996: 374). The debates on CTBT acquired momentum with such perceptions and preparations were underway. The CTBT was negotiated over a period of two and a half years in the Conference of Disarmament (CD) in Geneva. However, the CD was not able to arrive out a consensus and forward the text to the UN because of India’s reservations about some clauses of the proposed treaty. In August 1996, Australia requested the UN to reconvene the fiftieth UN General Assembly for the purpose of receiving and acting on the treaty. On 10 September 1996, the UN General Assembly adopted the CTBT by a vote of 158 to 3, with 5 abstentions. The treaty was opened for signature on 24 September 1996. The CTBT, as it had come into being, sought to prohibit all nuclear weapon test explosions or other nuclear explosions anywhere in the world. In order to verify compliance with its provisions, the treaty established a global network of monitoring facilities and allowed for on-site inspections of suspicious events. The treaty has a preamble, 17 articles, two treaty annexes and a protocol with two annexes detailing verification procedures. The preamble, while setting the overall political context of the treaty, stresses the need for the continued reduction of nuclear weapons worldwide with the ultimate goal of their elimination. It recognises that a test ban will constitute an effective measure of nuclear disarmament and non-proliferation by “constraining the development and qualitative improvement of nuclear weapons and ending the development of advanced new types of nuclear weapons.” As of 15 May 2000, 155 nations had signed, including all five nuclear weapon states and, 56 states, including France and the United Kingdom, have deposited their instruments of ratification.5 However, the treaty has been opposed by India which projected it as a case of ‘discrimination’ in order to prolong the issue of its own adherence to the ban. India’s CTBT policy itself was legitimised on the strength of a ‘national consensus’, political will, national sovereignty and self-determination. After Pokhran-II, arguments were even made in terms of India successfully breaking the monopoly of the hard-bargainers in the prestigious nuclear club. These were all narrow, short-sighted visions of public policies. Admittedly, there was hardly any continuity in India’s public position on nuclear arms, except for the rhetorical expressions. There has, however, been a remarkable continuity in India’s nuclear development programme, which always had, and still has, a military dimension. After Pokhran-II, the contradictions between New Delhi’s public position and the hitherto clandestine weapon-oriented programme had come to the fore, exposing the inherent contradictions in India’s nuclear posture. The crucial phases of India’s CTBT policy must be briefly outlined to expose these contradictions. In the first stage from 1954 to 1993, the general Indian position was in favour of a nuclear test ban regime, notwithstanding its own nuclear ambitions and the 1974 PNE. India took pride in the fact that Jawaharlal Nehru was the first statesman who put this proposal across the world community. However, it fell through because all the nuclear weapon powers including the former Soviet Union and China opposed it for obvious reasons. During 1993-94 the nuclear weapon powers, including Russia and

China, concluded that the time had come for a test ban regime because a nuclear diffusion order - particularly in the Third World as it has been in the offing - would be extremely dangerous. The second stage in India’s nuclear position begins here, when India co-sponsored (with the US) a resolution to this effect in the UN. For a short while this seemed to have sustained the earlier Indian position (Dixit 1996: 372). However, as the test ban regime was seriously conceived and about to be materialised in the form of a draft text, India began to change its position (Dixit 1996: 373). The apparently idealist position sustained until then was soon to be thoroughly redefined with a mix of hyperrealism and ‘global commitments’. The draft text was x-rayed to find out loopholes, and the diagnosis pointed to some ‘genetic defects’ in the proposed treaty. The nuclear hawks in India seized the occasion to pick holes in the text, thereby calling it as ‘discriminatory’ and ‘unequal’. Here, the basic arguments of the Indian state need to be examined. First, India argued that the CTBT in its ‘present form’ was ‘discriminatory’ and ‘unequal’ in the sense that it would foreclose the possibility of others, especially countries like India, enjoying or developing the technological capabilities, which the advanced nuclear weapon powers possessed. However, at no point did India raise this issue before 1993 (except in the context of NPT debate), nor even during 1993-94 when the draft text of the CTBT was getting ready. The arguments relating to the ‘discriminatory’ clauses of the CTBT further stressed that the treaty was not ‘comprehensive’ enough to prohibit sub-critical or zero-yield tests and computer simulation processes which would lead to fourth generation nuclear weapons (India 1996b). There are several implications of this argument. First of all, do all nuclear weapons powers have the technological capability to conduct sub critical tests? Certainly, the US had developed this technology. But what about other nuclear weapon powers who have already adhered to the CTBT? The fact was that India did not have adequate information to confirm the status of others. If it did, that should have been brought to the attention of the CD in Geneva and debated over it. However, other nuclear weapon powers like China, France, Russia, Britain, Pakistan and Israel never insisted that sub-critical tests be brought within the purview of the treaty. On the other hand, the treaty itself has a provision to incorporate changes or amendments into the text, the protocol or the annexes to the protocol under Article VII and any state party may propose these changes at any time after the entry into force. If India's concerns were genuine, couldn’t it be possible to bring in the question of subcritical tests by proposing amendments to the original text as a state party? It is true that amendments require a positive vote of a majority of the state parties with no state party casting a negative vote in the amendment conference (Article VII-5). Yet, India’s principled position and demands could have been forcefully argued within the Conference, and if there had been no results India could have safely withdrawn from the treaty. Article IX provides a provision by which each adherent shall, in exercising it's national sovereignty, have the right to withdraw if it decides that extraordinary events related to the subject matter of the treaty have jeopardised its supreme interests.6

Curiously enough, the Indian posture was fully exposed when the government announced, after the Pokhran-II tests, that Indian scientists had collected sufficient database for conducting sub-critical experiments, as also other non-explosive research and development activity.7 Since then the Indian position has been fairly clear-not to

press for bringing the question of sub-critical tests within the purview of the CTBT because prohibition of such tests would be a set back to Indian nuclear adventurism. Thus, the ‘unequal’ and ‘discriminatory’ character of the treaty is no longer relevant to India! One must note here the duplicity of India's approach. But the irony of the situation was that India did not find any problem in adhering to the highly discriminatory GATT Final Treaty, and thereby becoming a founding member of the World Trade Organisation (WTO)- one of the most powerful unequal economic regimes in the post-war period - almost at the same time when the CTBT question was being seriously debated. India’s bartering away of its freedom and sovereignty to the WTO regime has been masqueraded in its opposition to CTBT, as if national selfdetermination was still in the hands of the Indian state. Another major argument against the CTBT was that Article XIV of the treaty would seriously jeopardise the sovereign right of the Indian state. Under Article XIV, the treaty will not enter into force until it has been signed and ratified by 44 states - including the five nuclear-weapon States and the three ‘threshold states’ (India, Israel and Pakistan) listed by name in Annex 2 to the treaty. This clause was interpreted in such a way that under the existing conditions it was for the countries concerned to decide whether they should accede to it or not and, hence, nothing could be imposed on sovereign nations by unilateral measures. Ostensibly, the US was not very particular about this clause but it was vigorously insisted on by Russia, China and Britain with whom India had fairly good relations in the 1990s. However, an impression was created that these three powers were hiding behind India’s opposition because when India refused to sign the treaty - whereupon it could not come into force - they could go ahead with their nuclear ambitions. Does this mean that the US was a simplistically accepting this argument? The strength of the clause XIV, it should be noted, is that all 44 countries listed in the Annex 2 were expected to be willing partners in this test ban regime, and if this annex was set aside, it would amount to diluting the very commitment of the regime, creating new loopholes in the treaty, thereby prolonging the possibility of test ban and disarmament into an indefinite future. India also sought a linkage between the CTBT and nuclear disarmament, and it was pointed out that a time-bound nuclear disarmament programme would be a sine qua non for India’s joining the test ban regime (Navlakha 1999; Jayaprakash 2000). In fact, the preamble of the treaty recognises that an end to all nuclear explosions will constitute a meaningful step in the realisation of a systematic process to achieve nuclear disarmament. It also recognises that the cessation of such test explosions constitutes an effective measure of nuclear disarmament and non-proliferation in all its aspects. Wouldn’t it be premature to expect the adherents of the treaty to concede to any time frame for nuclear disarmament at a stage when even preliminary negotiations towards that end have not been completed? As a matter of fact, the CTBT and the Fissile Material cut-off Treaty (FMCT) would be positive steps in the direction of nuclear disarmament and they should not be prematurely interpreted to mean ‘disarmament treaties’. As it turned out, the Indian position was intended only to prolong the basic question and the post-Pokhran-II responses of the government have confirmed this.

At a later stage India also began to advance national security reasons to veto the treaty. This became more pronounced after the Pokhran-II explosions. Foreign Minister Jaswant Singh in a statement said that the decision to conduct the tests “was taken after due consideration of all factors relevant to India’s national security. These tests…address the security concerns of the Indian people and provide them with necessary assurance”(Government of India 1998:39). He also said that in undertaking these tests, “India has not violated any international treaty obligations. The CTBT, to which we do not subscribe, also contains provision permitting state parties to withdraw if they consider that their supreme interests are being jeopardised” (Government of India 1998: 39). The ‘principled’ position of India thus stands exposed. Earlier on 11 May 1998, the government, while justifying the nuclear tests, said that India would be prepared to consider being an adherent to some of the undertakings in the CTBT: "But this cannot obviously be done in a vacuum. It would necessarily be an evolutionary process from concept to commitment and would depend on a number of reciprocal activities” (Government of India 1998: 37). The ‘reciprocal activities’ actually meant beginning of fresh bargains with the US in the military-strategic realm. It reflected more of a collaborationist attitude of the BJP-led government with the US rather than a confrontationist stance at a higher level (Singh 1998: 41-52; Talbot 1999: 110-122). Yet, the fundamental question is whether India had any serious security threats that warranted militarisation and development of nuclear weapons during 1995-97. In fact, the so-called threats from Pakistan and China were largely blown out of proportion at that stage which also contradicted the statements of the Ministry of External Affairs and the Report of the Ministry of Defence. Contrary to popular belief, India's relations with Pakistan had shown signs of improvement in the mid-1990s. Notwithstanding occasional setbacks, the two countries understood each other's interests and had taken a number of steps to improve relations until the nuclear explosions in May 1998. More importantly, in the unfolding scenario, the US was not interested in setting up Pakistan against India. Former Prime Minister I.K.Gujral had said that while he was in office he had taken a decision that India’s foreign policy should not be Pakistan-specific. It is true that the BJP-led government failed to appreciate the positive changes and what followed was a deliberate policy of accentuating tension in the region. In the post-Pokhran-II security scenario, Pakistan's policy was to secure a credible balance vis-à-vis India, and the parity syndrome, at last, gave way to nuclear adventurism. Relations with China, on the other hand, were improving remarkably well in the 1990s. The Sino–Indian Agreements of 1993 and 1996 on the maintenance of peace and tranquillity along the line of actual control, and confidence building measures (CBMs) were good examples of this benign phase (Government of India 1996a: 169-171). Even as the relations were on a firm foot, India’s Defence Minister George Fernandes, and a few others, were impudent enough to call China a ‘potential threat’. The specific references to China in the letter written by Prime Minister A.B.Vajpayee to US President Bill Clinton on 11 May 1998, in the wake of Pokhran-II explosions8 and the response of the Ministry of External Affairs, on 16 May 1998 to a statement by China (Government of India 1998: 35-36) reflected the BJP-led government's policy of indiscreet provocation of its neighbours. Interestingly, the Ministry of External Affairs had issued a statement on 6 May 1998 saying that “there has been a steady improvement in India-China relations” and that "the high-level political dialogue has made an important contribution to

deepening understanding and fostering co-operation in diverse fields"(India 1998:35). Furthermore, the Ministry of Defence in its Annual Report 1998-99 said India does not regard China as an ‘adversary’ and sees Beijing as a ‘great neighbour’ with whom relations have "improved in recent years"(Government of India 1999). All this would confirm that there was a conscious manipulation of India's security environment by the government in order to justify its nuclear explosions, thereby scuttling the CTBT. It is true that in the broader agenda of the BJP, India’s nuclear weapon status has been a critical factor in mobilising popular sentiments for its militant nationalism. This certainly calls for ‘new’ and ‘potential’ threats to India’s security. But India argues that it cannot take any chance on the question of national security, the same logic could be applied to all countries, particularly the nuclear weapon powers. India is not the only country in the world facing threats from internal and external sources. The US has, perhaps, the largest number of enemies across the world, and that would have been sufficient for them to sabotage the treaty as they did till the early 1990s (interestingly, the hardliners in the US used precisely the same argument for rejecting the CTBT in the Senate). But the US government was forced by circumstances to go along with the test ban treaty as the case with Britain, France, China and Russia. This, however, does not mean that the US track record has all along been clean and trustworthy. Nonetheless, its nuclear imperialist machinations could be effectively countered through legitimate international mechanisms of control and containment, and the question is whether countries like India should shirk their responsibility by moving away from their longproclaimed goals of nuclear disarmament and world peace. It was certainly bad news for New Delhi that a large majority of the Third World countries did not share India’s viewpoint. Except Bhutan and Libya, not even a single non–aligned country supported the Indian position, and it was nothing but ignominious isolation in the world fora in its fiftieth year history. New Delhi still claimed that it had the mandate of the Indian people and the Third World to fight an ‘unjust’ CTBT! But hardly was there any Third World country which believed that India’s position was genuine and in tune with its disarmament policy. The contradictions of the Indian nuclear posture became fully evident with the PokhranII explosions. In fact, India’s CTBT policy entered the third stage with it. Evidently, the nuclear test explosions were the end-result of intense lobbying by the hawks who have been increasingly obsessed with weaponisation, impatient for quite a long time due to lack of opportunities for a public demonstration of their ‘hard work’. It is true that the BJP seized the opportunity, for it felt no qualms about the implications of the tests for India's future disarmament policy or for its relations with South Asian neighbours. The nuclear tests have been used by the party to promote its narrow political objectives by whipping up jingoistic, narrow nationalist sentiments.

Later on, India announced that it would observe a ‘voluntary moratorium’ and refrain from conducting underground nuclear test explosions (Government of India 1998: 4042). At the same time, India pointed out that it would "ensure credibility of its nuclear deterrent through other means that did not require explosive testing.” On 17 August 1999, the government of India released India’s draft nuclear doctrine prepared by the

27-member National Security Council and Advisory Board (NSAB), which called for ‘‘development of a credible, minimum deterrent’’(Kargil Review Committee 2000: 205). The doctrine was "necessitated by the security environment" and "strategic autonomy in decision-making." It "envisages assured capability to shift from peace time deployment to fully employable forces in the shortest possible time, and the ability to retaliate effectively even in a case of significant degradation by hostile strikes."9 When doubts were expressed by press persons in New Delhi whether the doctrine would come in conflict with the provisions of the CTBT, K. Subrahmanyam, Convenor of the NSAB, contended that the "treaty did not prohibit research and development, including subcritical testing."10 India’s Foreign Minister Jaswant Singh later said that after the Pokhran-II nuclear tests "we have ensured the credibility of our nuclear deterrent into the foreseeable future; our scientists are now confident of conducting sub critical tests, as also other non-explosive R and D activity necessary for the purpose."11 Interestingly enough, the CTBT debate has been revived in the post–Pokhran-II phase with an entirely different objective and dimension, and, surprisingly, the most vociferous opponents of the treaty during 1993-1997 had now become the best defenders of the treaty (Dubey 1999; Bidwai 2000). The earlier arguments against the CTBT are apparently ‘outdated’ in the context of the newfound role of India as a ‘nuclear weapon power’! 12 In fact, the proclaimed willingness to sign the CTBT was apparently another tactical posture by India seeking to legitimise its nuclear weapons and ‘limited nuclear deterrent’ doctrine rather than reflecting the basic commitment of the country to nuclear disarmament. Conclusion Much has been said and written about India’s ‘principled’ position on the CTBT. Yet, India’s own retreat on the questionhas been consciously omitted in debate for obvious reasons. The contestations surrounding the CTBT have been given even an aura of ‘holiness’ so that the BJP-led government’s ‘unalloyed’ nationalism has a legitimate political space to prosper. Here, the text of the CTBT is presented as ‘unholy’ and the test is projected as sacred! With that India’s obsession for militarism has reached a decisive stage. This essay has attempted to delve into this by exposing the myth of ‘credibility’ and ‘strength’, which India was supposed to have gained while encountering critics, both at home and abroad. In sum, one can say with a fair degree of certainty that in future India may find it difficult to sustain a credible and transparent position on the nuclear question, particularly in the background of the Pokhran-II tests. The longheld ambiguity that has been maintained all along is still perpetuated in one form or another even after the tests. Nowhere is this more evident than in India’s CTBT policy, which is inherently contradictory.

Notes 1. For example, see BJP, Election Manifesto 1998.wwwbjp.org; also see Organiser, vol.49, No.42, 17 May 1998; and Kapur (1976: 174).

2. See the statement of CPI leader Indrajit Gupta in Lok Sabha Debates (27 May 1998) www.alfa.nic; for the joint statement of CPI and CPI(M), see The Hindu, 30 May 1998; also see Ram (1999: 108—09); and Communist Party of India (Marxist)(1995: 88-89). 3. For details, see The Times of India, 12 May 1998; The Hindu, 12 May 1998; Indian Express, 13 May 1998; The Times of India, 6 June 1998; Indian Express, 29 May 1998.

4. Though Jawaharlal Nehru’s commitment to nuclear disarmament is well known, there have been attempts to show that he too was interested in having a weapon’s option. Such attempts are obviously to legitimise the ongoing weaponoriented programme in the nuclear establishment. The report of the Kargil Review Committee (2000: 200) is a good example. It says: “ Even Jawaharlal Nehru, a champion of disarmament, realised the military significance of nuclear power. In a speech in 1946 in Bombay he hoped that India will use the atomic

force for constructive purposes. But if India is threatened, she will inevitably try to defend herself by all means at her disposal.(10.41: 200). Elsewhere the report says: “Nehru’s vision of a technologically advanced India helped the country build the basic infrastructure to support a nuclear energy as well as a nuclear weapons programme” (10.43: 200).

5. For details see www. ctbto.org. 6.

Ibid.

7. BARC News Letter, 172(May 1998:1-4; and Government of India, Department of Atomic Energy, Nuclear India 32/7-8 (January- February 1999):14-15. 8. The New York Times, 13 May 1998. 9. The Times of India,18 August 1999. 10. Ibid. 11. The Hindu, 29 November 1999. 12. See reports in The Times of India, 13 December1999, and The Hindu, 5 December 1999.

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