In a conversation with a group of editors and analysts here, the U.S. Ambassador David Mulford affirmed that President George W. Bush’s offer to help India develop the nuclear energy option is a “serious one”.

Mulford, however, underlined the “many legal and other difficulties” that have prevented such nuclear cooperation over the last three decades “have not gone away”. The proposed talks are aimed at sorting out those difficulties.

The US proposal, part of a broad new strategic initiative towards India unveiled by the Bush Administration, signals a major shift in American nuclear policy towards India. Ever since New Delhi conducted its first nuclear test in May 1974, the idea of nuclear cooperation with India has been a taboo in Washington. “We are now moving in a different direction”, Mulford said.

It might be recalled that the US company General Electric built India’s first nuclear power plant at Tarapur under an agreement signed in 1962.

The Administration would need broad support from the US Congress before it can either waive the requirements of the current American legislation on international cooperation in nuclear energy or come up with a new legislative mandate. The Indian government which has long sought such cooperation with the US is open to talks with the Bush Administration. India’s negotiating approach is expected to be consistent with its national security requirements.

Meanwhile, in a speech on Monday at a seminar organised by the Institute for Defence Studies and Analyses here, External Affairs Minister Natwar Singh had reaffirmed the importance of nuclear electric power in India’s energy mix and the role of international cooperation in accelerating the nation’s atomic energy development.

Singh added that India has “repeatedly said that every cooperation project in nuclear power would be open to international safeguards”. India’s recent attempts to buy additional nuclear power reactors from Russia and France had come to nought. Both Moscow and Paris had to defer to American opposition to such sales to India.

Natwar Singh called on the international community to “discard the old mindset and acknowledge the record of states, like India, who have proved time and again that they are reliable partners in the global effort to ensure non-proliferation.”

Singh also declared that “India may not be a party to the NPT, but, our conduct has always been consistent with the key provisions of the (Nuclear Non-Proliferation) Treaty as they apply to nuclear weapon states”.

While Indian and American officials are mum on the terms of a potential nuclear deal between the two nations, analysts here say that a combination of credible assurances from India on non-proliferation and putting some of its civilian reactors under international safeguards could help clinch a path-breaking accord.

Mulford said results from President Bush’s ambitious agenda?that also includes defence industrial partnership and enhancing India’s role in global institutions?could begin to unfold in the coming months.

The proposed visit by Natwar Singh to the US in the near future and that by PM Manmohan Singh to Washington in July are expected to provide the impetus for moving the proposals for wide-ranging cooperation between the two countries forward.

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