A new civil nuclear pact will be signed between India and Russia today, Prime Minister Manmohan Singh has arrived in Russia to hold talks with the country's President Dmitry Medvedev.
The Indo-Russian pact goes deeper than the 123 agreement between India and the US. As per the deal, it will be ensured that there are uninterrupted uranium fuel supplies from Moscow in case of termination of bilateral ties in this field. There will be a total of three defence agreements after summit talks in Kremlin today. Also, the pact with Russia is reportedly a major improvement over the 123 pact with the US.
While the 123 contract stipulates that India have to return already supplied components if the nuclear agreement is terminated, the India-Russia pact relates to reprocessing, nuclear equipments and transfer of technology. Moreover, fuel supply between India and Russia will not be seized in case the agreement is terminated for any reason.
Manmohan Singh will also meet Prime Minister Vladimir Putin after his talks with Medvedev at the Kremlin regarding taking the strategic ties to new heights. According to Singh, 'the Indo-Russia atomic cooperation is a key pillar in bilateral relations.' Even thought the pact is between India and Russia, the bulk of the work consist of construction of nuclear sites in India. The other highlight is the allowance of transfer of enrichment and reprocessing technology and also built-in reprocessing consent rights for all future Russian reactors supplied to India.
India and Russia signed an agreement last year that provides construction of four Russian nuclear plants in Kudankulam in Tamil Nadu, apart from five others at yet undecided places. Haripur in West Bengal would in all probability be the other site. At present Russia is building two reactors in Kudankulam.
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