Justice Krishna Iyer and India’s Nuclear Swaraj
The opponents of Indo-US nuclear deal found a strong voice in their favor in Justice Krishna Iyer’s letter to Mr. M. N. Ramamurthy who filed a PIL in India’s Supreme Court to oppose the nuclear deal.
The 90+ year old living legend, former Justice of the Supreme Court, renowned legal scholar and social activist, V. R. Krishna Iyer has come out with a strong attack on what he has described as the “dangerous” civilian nuclear energy agreement with the United States. He called it “a dangerous treaty... and deprives our nation of nuclear swaraj.”
The timing of the letter is also perfect for the opponents of the deal as Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and his team made significant progress with the US counterparts during the G-8 summit in Germany. Mr. Singh also launched a strong campaign to gather support of his countrymen by saying that every patriot should support the Indo-US nuclear deal as it is in India’s national interest.
It is clear why the Prime Minister is interested in the success of this deal. He sees it as the best way to end India’s nuclear apartheid – maintain the strategic nuclear weapons capability while gaining access to nuclear fuel and technology for meaningful expansion of civilian nuclear energy sector to maintain the fast growing economy. By the way, this is the same policy the previous Prime Minister Mr. Vajpayee advocated and is understood to have started negotiations with the Bush administration for a similar deal. Remember the Suo Motu Statement by Prime Minister Vajpayee in Parliament on 27th May, 1998: “… Government has already announced that India will now observe a voluntary moratorium and refrain from conducting underground nuclear test explosions. We have also indicated willingness to move towards a de-jure formalisation of this declaration.”
Why is Justice Krishna Iyer so opposed to the deal? It is not possible to find out the real reason for his vigorous opposition by reading his statements published in the newspaper. He declared it is a dangerous deal, but did not say why and how it is dangerous. He served the country for a long time with distinction and he is genuine well-wisher of India.
To understand his mind, I studied his biography and researched his work as a politician and legal scholar. One plausible reason for his strong opposition is that he is looking at this deal with his socialist/communist blinkers on. For a communist, any kind of deal with the US is against India’s national interest. His recent pronouncements are clearly consistent with this characterization. He is a strong opponent of globalization. For him, it is an MNC euphemism for rob-grab-globalism. He was a lashing campaigner against patent law changes, GATT, WTO etc. Of course, he was a cabinet member of the first communist government in Kerala in 1957. Only recently, in a letter to Mr. Karat, dated March 15, 2007, Justice Krishna Iyer wrote, “I hold Com. Jyoti Basu as a creative wonder of the Communist Marxist Party. As you know, I remained in power with the Communist Government in 1956 in Kerala under the charismatic Chief ministership of EMS, the great Leftist thinker.”
Therefore, I will say to supporters of Indo-US deal not to loose heart. Justice Krishna Iyer is a brilliant legal scholar, but his judgments in this regard are guided by the political philosophy of the past that failed everywhere. His opinions can, therefore, be respectfully set aside as they are not born out of his independent mind.
Govinda Bhisetti
June 12, 2007
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