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"India's opposition Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) Wednesday asked the government to withdraw the nuclear liability bill in the wake of the 1984 Bhopal gas tragedy verdict which only gave light penalty to the accused, reported the Indo-Asian News Service. A spokesman for the BJP said the Congress-led government should withdraw the nuclear liability bill as "the aim of the bill is to please Americans". The BJP had earlier demanded a revision of the civil nuclear liability legislation in the light of the Bhopal gas disaster, in which a gas leak from the U.S.-based Union Carbide killed at least 20,000 people 25 years ago in the central Indian city."

"Pakistan has 60 nuclear warheads and with two new plutonium reactors nearing completion in Khusab, its weapons grade plutonium production will jump seven-fold, according to latest figures released by Swedish institute SIPRI. "Our conservative estimates are that Pakistan has sixty warheads and could produce 100 nuclear weapons at short notice," the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (SIPRI) said in its latest annual report. SIPRI also said that Islamabad was developing an air launched cruise missile Ra'ad and had also carried out four tests of its land launched sub-sonic cruise missile Babur. But said it was not clear whether these missiles would be developed to carry nuclear warheads. The Swedish think-tank said that Pakistan's Khusab I reactor was giving the country 10 to 12 kgs of weapons grade plutonium. "

"Traces of uranium have been found in a large number of autistic children in India's northern state of Punjab. The metal, used for generating nuclear energy and to make nuclear bombs, is thought to be the reason behind their autism. Five-and-a-half-year-old Dashamveer Singh was born premature. It was one of the reasons behind his slow mental development. He is being treated at Baba Farid Centre For Special Children. "A normal kid would be active. He would start sitting up by six months of age and start reacting. My child did no such thing. After one year, he could neither sit nor stand. So, we sought treatment for him at the centre," said Satvinder Kaur, mother of Dashamvee. There are many children at the centre with similar symptoms - most of them are from a small town in India's northern state of Punjab. "

United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon has asked the international community to build on the momentum generated by recent progress made towards disarmament to rid the world of nuclear weapons. "The UN and the Conference on Disarmament should seize this moment and be in the vanguard of efforts towards a world free of nuclear weapons," Ban said pointing to the "promising signs" made in the past few months, including initiatives by the US, the UK, France, China, Russia, the European Union, non-aligned countries and other governments.

Two days after Prime Minister Manmohan Singh indicated that the Centre would address the concerns expressed by various quarters over the proposed uranium mining project in Meghalaya, the influential Khasi Sudents Union has strongly pursued its opposition to the project. "The Centre should not adopt measures of inducement, coercion, intimidation and force to push with proposed project to mine uranium in the State," the KSU said in representation submitted to the Prime Minister through the chief secretary of Meghalaya. The KSU while asking the Centre to cancel the project cited the public hearing held on June 12, 2007 "where 75 per cent of the public in the proposed uranium sites showed their opposition".

After over two decades of work, India's first nuclear reactor that will breed more fuel than it consumes will be ready next year, say senior officials at the Kalpakkam nuclear complex 80 km from here. The heavily-guarded complex is a hive of activity now as the 4,000-odd experts who are designing and building the 500-MW prototype fast breeder reactor (PFBR) can finally foresee when it will be ready. A breeder reactor is one that breeds more material for a nuclear fission reaction than it consumes, so that the reaction - that ultimately produces electricity - can continue.

After the radioactive scrap metal, found in lift buttons, installed in France were traced to a foundry near Khopoli in Maharashtra, the Atomic Energy Regulatory Board (AERB) has written to Indian port authorities to check all imported scrap material for radioactivity content before allowing it inside the country. "We have written letters to concerned authorities (ports) to check all the imported scrap for radioactivity content before bringing to the country for melting purposes," Vice-Chairman of the AERB, S K Chande said today.

Cultivation of sunflowers in Jadugora region can save the environment as well as villagers from getting affected by uranium radiation, a Jharkhand-based environmentalist has claimed today. "The sunflowers reduce radioactive contamination of soil and groundwater by absorbing the heavy metal particles present in them. The metal particles absorbed by the root of the plant remain intact in the tissues of the plant without effecting its health," said Nitish Priyadarshi, the environmentalist. The plants are then carefully disposed to get rid the radioactive particles, he added.

The CPI(M) today said the Indo-US nuclear deal would lead to Congress' exit from power at the Centre and no government after that would go ahead with the agreement. "Take it (the nuclear deal) to the people of the country (to fight the elections). The people of this country, who are patriotic and anti-imperialist in nature, will never accept this agreement and will vote Congress out of power," CPI(M) General Secretary Prakash Karat said.

Advancing the hope for an early Indo-US nuclear accord, the Senate Foreign Relations Committee voted to approve the Bill by 19 to 2, sending it to the full Senate (rpt) Senate. The two law makers who voted against the deal were Senators Barbara Boxer (by proxy) and Russel Feingold, both Democrats. Democratic Presidential nominee Senator Barack Obama and the Vice Presidental candidate Senator Joseph Biden, currently the Chair of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, voted by proxies to move the agreement to the Senate floor.

WE may have all missed the most interesting point in the kerfuffle over the Indo-US nuclear deal. Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and Congress President Sonia Gandhi have emerged as the greatest advertising team since World War II. The strategy is not dissimilar to that employed by Germany and Italy in the war: Repeat a lie often enough and it will be perceived as the truth. Take the promise of electricity to every village. The claim is arrant nonsense. The eight reactors the government wants to purchase in the next four years - commissioning will be much later - will not increase the share of nuclear power in the energy mix beyond 2.5 percent.

While the cancer risks of radiation exposure are well documented, much more research is needed into the effects of low-dose radiation on cardiovascular risk. These are the conclusions of a Comment in this week's edition of The Lancet, authored by Kiyohiko Mabuchi, Parveen Bhatti, and Alice Sigurdson at the National Cancer Institute, National Institutes of Health, Bethesda, MD, USA.

With the Indo-US civilian nuclear energy initiative back on track after the recent trust vote in Parliament, government's key negotiator on Climate Change Shyam Saran on Saturday pinned hope that "clean energy" would help tackle climate change threats. Speaking at a seminar on "Climate change: Will India's Growth story confront new constraints?" he said, "We may look forward to a major expansion in nuclear power generation in the period upto 2030-31," to meet growing energy needs.

Varanasi: Groundwater in Varanasi and adjoining areas is contaminated with uranium, according to a study by a group of scientists. The study conducted by G.C. Chowdhary, former Professor at the Geology Department of Banaras Hindu University, and S.K. Agarwal, also a professor of Geology, has shown that the drinking water in the University premises and some other places in the city contains radioactive uranium more than the recommended limit.

A bloc of Indian left-wing and communist parties announced Tuesday they were pulling out of the country's coalition government in protest against a nuclear energy deal with the United States. The decision, however, is not expected to cause the collapse of the Congress-led government of Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, who last week managed to secure the support of a regional party.

Ahead of their crucial meeting with the UPA on the Indo-US civil nuclear agreement, the Left parties led by CPI(M) General Secretary Prakash Karat today raised the issue of uranium shortage to destroy the government's bid to clinch the agreement.

NEW DELHI: Acute shortage of uranium is badly hitting power generation in the six nuclear plants in the country as the generation is not even half of the current total installed capacity of 3,770 MW. Though the Government is working on new initiatives, the demand for uranium, which is going to shoot up in the coming years to meet the nuclear power generation goal of 20,000 MW by 2020, could be met only from "external sources," said Union Minister of State for Power Jairam Ramesh.

Shillong, May 20: The Meghalaya government has clarified that no decision has been taken on uranium mining in the state, despite the Union minister of state for power, Jairam Ramesh's claim that it was in favour of a nuclear plant.

A little learning, it is said, is a dangerous thing. That's what happened to a policeman and his colleagues who balked at the idea of touching a sealed packet supposedly containing a cake of radioactive uranium.

The CPI(M) today said the party will strengthen protests against the Indo-US nuclear deal notwithstanding results of tomorrow's trust vote in the Lok Sabha. "The Government had destroyed our trust on assurances of discussing the deal before going ahead with it. Now we will strengthen our protests if the Government still remains adamant about pursuing the deal after the trust vote," CPI(M) Politburo member Sitaram Yechury said.