India has effectively silenced its nuclear-have critics, who had been shouting blue murder right since Pokhran-II, by enunciating its comprehensive no-first-use nuclear doctrine. This is one pledge which the USA, France and Britain have been refusing to take all along. India had offered this concept for any bilateral or collective agreement immediately after the tests in May but has now elevated it to a unilateral plane. Under this doctrine, India would never use nuclear weapons against non-nuclear weapon countries and would not be the FIRST to use nuclear weapons against nuclear-weapon countries. China had given a similar undertaking in 1964. Russia did so in the 1980s but later revised its stand. Thus India and China are the only two countries to have committed themselves. While throwing the ball back into the court of the USA and its friends, India has also reassured its non-nuclear neighbours and friends who were being brainwashed by the powers that be about the threat that a nuclear-capable big brother (India) posed. Here is an offer which Pakistan has refused to match and if the world community is keen to prove that it is non-partisan, it should take note of the varying commitments of the two countries. Not only that, the government has even made it bold to say that if every country is committed to non-proliferation of fissile material and if there is no different treatment for the existing stockpile of fissile material, India is also willing to sign the proposed FMCT. While informing the Lok Sabha of the doctrine on Tuesday, the Prime Minister, Mr Atal Behari Vajpayee, also assured the nation that its arsenal would be pegged at the lowest possible level required for credible deterrence. This arsenal is a necessary protection against blackmail by other nuclear powers, without in any way starting an arms race.

When Mr Vajpayee said that India, which had announced a "voluntary moratorium" on further underground nuclear tests, was now willing to "move towards a de jure formalisation of our voluntary undertaking", he was perhaps giving a signal that New Delhi was prepared to eventually join the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty (CTBT). This candid announcement can be depended on to create a furore within the country of the same intensity as the May blasts had caused worldwide. There are two reasons for this. One, New Delhi has been castigating the CTBT so stridently that any "turn-around" is bound to raise the hackles of those who are still opposed to it. Two, the political climate in Delhi is such that Opposition parties are bound to join issue just for the sake of embarrassing the government. One wishes that this vital foreign policy matter is not made an object of political dribbling and a national consensus is quickly evolved. The government has to take the lead in this regard. The signals from Mrs Sonia Gandhi's statement on Tuesday are positive. Everyone must appreciate that there are several valid reasons for re-examining the treaty. The most significant of them is that the situation has changed substantially after the explosions. Scientists have said categorically that they possess so much baseline nuclear data that further tests are not required. Second, the overall global situation for India is such that not signing the treaty will do greater harm than signing it. And third, the CTBT provisions provide India the right to review this decision (of adhering to the treaty) if in its judgement, extraordinary events crop up to jeopardise its supreme national interests. It should be noted that when India had conducted the tests, China had threatened to go ahead with further tests exactly on this provision. New Delhi ought to undertake a comprehensive exercise to allay the domestic apprehensions with regard to a possible change in tack. The public must be made aware that signing will not compromise the country's position and would rather help it "engage meaningfully" with the nuclear five, a commitment which the USA has been seeking. The dialogue in this regard has been continuing. Now that India has steeled itself with the no-first-use pledge, perhaps Mr Jaswant Singh will be bargaining from a position of comparative strength when he goes to Washington for talks with the US Deputy Secretary of State, Mr Strobe Talbott, later this month. This will never be said officially but it is very important to assess what we get in return from the key interlocuters for the commitment to the dialogue on the CTBT. The minimum that New Delhi has been demanding is the lifting of restrictions on export of high technology. The nuclear accommodation that it has now shown should be adequately matched by Washington.

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Courtesy: The Tribune: 6 August, 2019