When The Buddha Smiled on India...
On 12 th October 1973, David Davies- a geophysicist at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology who worked on seismic detection of underground nuclear tests- predicted that India would be the sixth country to conduct nuclear weapon tests. After 7 months he was proven correct by the ingenuity of Indian scientists and the fortitude of the then Prime Minister Indira Gandhi. Canada sold a 40 megawatt Canadian-Indian Reactor, U.S. (CIRUS) to India in 1956. India had the necessary manpower and capacity to develop and test a nuclear weapon. The heavy water needed to control Nuclear Fission had been provided by the US. So what made India abstain from performing the nuclear test and from becoming the first Nuclear Power? It is probably the chaste intention to maintain a mellow camaraderie with the other countries or a mere lack of grit in the Indian leadership. Meanwhile India refused to sign the Nuclear Non-Proliferation treaty in 1970. When questioned over it, our ambassador to t