The 'mischief' at Kaiga

Nuclear power regulation needs transparency

The so-called ‘mischief’ of an allegedly ‘disgruntled’ element at the Kaiga Atomic Power Plant (KAPP) could not have occurred at a more inopportune time for the retiring secretary of the Department of Atomic Energy (DAE), Anil Kakodkar. Instead of capping his career with the announcement of the India-Canada civil nuclear cooperation agreement, Dr Kakodkar demits office with the ignominy of the Kaiga incident grabbing the headlines. The contamination of drinking water with tritium, with 55 employees consuming the contaminated water, was a malevolent and criminal act that deserves severe punishment. While the chairman of the Atomic Energy Regulatory Board (AERB) has assured that the exposure level of the affected employees is within international norms, as specified by the International Commission on Radiological Protection (ICRP), it is above the AERB’s own limit. The Kaiga incident raises once again questions about the efficacy and transparency of our regulatory systems. With India planning to increase nuclear power generation and open up the sector to private investment, the government must put in place more transparent regulatory systems. Moreover, the DAE must liberate itself from the responsibility of nuclear power generation, limiting itself only to the strategic programme.

The existing regime in which the DAE takes on multiple roles and obligations must end. The Indian nuclear establishment has been far too prickly on issues of transparency and is happy to damn anyone who questions its competence or track record. While its bunker mentality of the past is entirely understandable, given the hostile external environment in which the Indian nuclear programme had to be developed, the increasingly more benign global environment should make them more relaxed and responsive to questions from outside. The Indian Parliament has every right to seek and secure the full facts about the Kaiga incident, as indeed any other such incident or issue. The problem with most parliamentarians is that they are happy to make patriotic speeches about national pride and such like without asking crucial questions relating to performance. The DAE is as accountable to the nation’s political leadership as any other department of the government. If targets have not been met, if power plants are not functioning to full capacity, if the highest standards of safety are not being maintained, officials and scientists must be held accountable and made answerable. The dog days of reinventing the wheel with no help and little funding are over. Civil nuclear power plants, in the public sector and the private, should function like any other power plant, with the full glare of external scrutiny.