N-tests: quot;DRDO focus hurt DAE moralequot;

NEW DELHI, DEC 9: The initial euphoria of the nuclear blasts may have died down but there's a quiet introspection going on in the scienti...

NEW DELHI, DEC 9: The initial euphoria of the nuclear blasts may have died down but there8217;s a quiet introspection going on in the scientific establishment. One issue that has rankled some is that it was the Defence Research and Development Organization DRDO that got a major credit for the blasts while scientists of Department of Atomic Energy DAE were marginalized.

When asked about this, Anil Kakodkar, director of the Bhabha Atomic Research Center BARC in Mumbai, says: 8220;It does affect you sometimes and you do feel bad about it. After all, the thing had been done for a national cause.8221; But in the same breath he says that this is not a complaint. 8220;You don8217;t do these things with an eye on credit rights, you do these because you have a mandate to carry out.8221; And once that is done you 8220;forget8221; about it.

On being asked whether he worried that this non-recognition would have any affect on his 5,000-strong scientific force, he said: 8220;No question about that. I also worry about the morale of theforce.8221; But on a philosophical note, he adds that at the DAE 8220;if we are given a mandate and we do it to the best of our abilities8230;that is happiness.8221;

Soon after the nuclear tests the chiefs of DAE and DRDO had stated that both organizations had 8220;effectively and efficiently co-ordinated and integrated their respective technological strengths in a national mission to confer the country with a capability to vacate nuclear threats.8221;

Even then sceptics had said that it was an unequal marriage as the DRDO8217;s role was limited only to supplying the chemical explosive technology. Despite several attempts by The Indian Express

, A P J Abdul Kalam, chief of DRDO, or K Santanam, senior DRDO scientist couldn8217;t be reached because they were travelling.

But there are others who are more forthcoming to talk about this 8220;unequal marriage.8221; The father of the 1974 nuclear bomb Raja Ramanna who is also a Member of Parliament confirms that the role of many of the defence laboratories is 8220;overdone8221; and exceptthe Terminal Ballistics Research Laboratory at Chandigarh, which supplied the chemical explosion technology others had 8220;very little to do.8221;

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Lending weight to DAE8217;s sense of despair, he adds that nuclear explosions are 8220;purely an atomic energy program.8221; On being asked then how come the mission director for Shakti 98 was from DRDO and not DAE, he said: 8220;At atomic energy establishments we don8217;t call anybody anything. That is culture of the defence establishments, we just do things and we do it right.8221;