US hawks want a longer blacklist

Among the dozens of names the hard-liners would like to see in the list are firms like Keltec and Keltron, two Kerala high tech industries. Keltec, they say, makes parts for India8217;s rocket program including components for liquid propulsion system, propellanttanks and precision machines for rocket applications. Keltron is said to manufacture electrical packages for ISRO8217;s inertial guidance system.

Although proliferation hawks have dredged up even little-known firms like Rama Krishna Engineering Works, Chennai, and Project and Development India Ltd, Dhanbad, they are far from satisfied. They say the US toothcomb has slipped over firms like Central Electrical and Chemical Research Unit CERCI in Tamil Nadu, which they suspect does missile work for DRDO.

While India8217;s high-tech procurement is fairly transparent and not surreptitious like Pakistan8217;s or Iraq8217;s, the acquirement patterns have, however, been closely monitored by the US experts, including those from the CIA8217;s Non-Proliferation Center, and private analysts. For instance, analysts have often made a big to-do about Bharat Electronics Ltd., which has an office in New York, and which is said to have ordered some 4000 components last year. Most of these components, they say, went to India8217;s missileprogram.

Indian officials express incredulity over the charges, saying the orders were transparent and the items were available in the open market. Most did not require any licensing, and where they did, the scrutiny was intense and pervasive.

For instance, they say the hard-liners are needlessly going over the top on issues like procurement of modest supercomputers, including one bought by Tata Consultancy for messaging and file management. That supercomputer is hardly super8217; now, since it has an unpretentious power of 2,062 Million Theoretical Operations Per Second MTOPS. Indian researchers have pieced together more powerful machines, using parallel processing.

The scaremongering and misunderstanding following the nuclear tests now threatens to scupper even programs which the US government willingly initiated with India.

For example, Pentagon hawks have objected to the supply by the US, of radiation warning badges and other environment-monitoring equipment worn by workers in Indian nuclearestablishments to monitor radiation. The equipment was supplied on humanitarian grounds after a thorough scrutiny by the commerce department.

But the no-sayers argue that such equipment makes it safer for Indian researchers working on nuclear programs and is tantamount to subsidising or supporting India8217;s bomb-making, since the dividing line between New Delhi8217;s civilian and military nuclear programs is blurred or non-existent. Such equipment, they insist, should be supplied only to nuclear facilities which are under full-scope international safeguards.

The latest entities list marks the victory of hard-liners in the administration 8212;- particularly the Pentagon 8212;- and thinktanks over the more benign and business-oriented line of the commerce department and sections of state department. Indian businesses, while upset, are unfazed.

8220;It is a setback to the overall business atmosphere which was already suffering in the aftermath of the tests. But in terms of procurement, it is not serious. The case thatIndian firms were buying loads of sensitive US stuff is overstated,8221; a representative of the Confederation of Indian Industries said.

The Indian version has some merit. According to commerce department figures, sensitive US technology supplied to India in 1997 was worth a bare 100 million 8212;- 2.6 million worth of nuclear equipment, 4.4 million worth of missile-related goods, and 94.7 million worth of equipment classified as national-security items. In terms of international arms trade, it is a pittance.