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= Pokhran-II =
==The objectives==
[https://epaper.timesgroup.com/Olive/ODN/TimesOfIndia/shared/ShowArticle.aspx?doc=TOIDEL%2F2018%2F05%2F12&entity=Ar01813&sk=555CE867&mode=text  Indrani Bagchi, Tests that made world see India in different light, May 13, 2018: ''The Times of India'']

[[File: PM Atal Bihari Vajpayee with defence minister George Fernandes and DRDO chief APJ Abdul Kalam at the Pokhran test site in May 1998.jpg|PM Atal Bihari Vajpayee with defence minister George Fernandes and DRDO chief APJ Abdul Kalam at the Pokhran test site in May 1998 <br/> From: [https://epaper.timesgroup.com/Olive/ODN/TimesOfIndia/shared/ShowArticle.aspx?doc=TOIDEL%2F2018%2F05%2F12&entity=Ar01813&sk=555CE867&mode=text  Indrani Bagchi, Tests that made world see India in different light, May 13, 2018: ''The Times of India'']|frame|500px]]

Twenty years ago, a sudden late-afternoon announcement by then Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee and his national security adviser, Brajesh Mishra, shook the world. On 11th and 13th May, India conducted a set of five nuclear tests, setting the country on the road to not merely being a nuclear power, but a country deserving of a space at the global high table.

Rakesh Sood, former diplomat and someone who was involved in the post-nuclear tests diplomacy, said India had three objectives. “First was to validate new designs to ensure credibility of the nuclear deterrent as the data set from the 1974 test was limited. Second was to declare that India was now a nuclear weapon state and modify the terms of our engagement with other states accordingly. Third was to generate an acceptance of India as a responsible state with an impeccable nonproliferation record.”

The nuclear tests announcement was followed closely by a massive global outreach by India, starting with the United States.

The first response was outright condemnation issued from every multilateral platform. But in a counter-intuitive action, then foreign minister Jaswant Singh and US deputy secretary Strobe Talbott began a conversation — that led to a whole new relationship being built between US and India. As Raja Mohan, director Carnegie India says, the tests “were needed to end India’s international isolation. They provided the basis for reconciliation with the global nuclear order, and redefined our relationship with the US”.

Former NSA, Shivshankar Menon believes the tests “shook loose our relations with all major powers, US, China, even Pakistan. The world had got used to a certain kind of India. That was challenged, successfully”. Former foreign secretary S Jaishankar says the tests created one of the prerequisites for India’s aspiration to become a leading power. “The actions we took 20 years ago ensured our national security. Our responsible record and subsequent engagements ensured global understanding of our policies. That is also shown by our nuclear collaborations around the world.”

The 1998 nuclear tests began the process for the world to acknowledge India as a responsible nuclear power. It was something Indian strategists said ad infinitum, that from 1974 despite decades of economic and technological sanctions, India had remained true to the highest NPT standards despite being an NPT outlier. While harmonising itself with the global nuclear order, the tests and their aftermath ironically destroyed the prevalent “nuclear superstructure”.

Ironically, with Pakistan, the 1998 tests — Pakistan followed soon after — gave Islamabad-Rawalpindi a sense of a ‘threshold’ below which they could continue to wage a proxy war, most spectacularly during Kargil. Since then, Pakistan has taken the riskier path, developing tactical nuclear weapons, while India separated its civil and military programmes and put a nuclear doctrine in place.

Two decades on, Pokhran-II culminated in the India-US nuclear deal, membership of three of four global non-proliferation regimes and a waiver from the NSG, doors that had been closed to India.

Taking the long view, Ashley Tellis, senior fellow at Carnegie, who helped to negotiate the nuclear deal for US described the tests as “a turning point in India’s engagement with the world — long overdue, but still incomplete, investment in assuring Indian security”.

==The events==
[http://indiatoday.intoday.in/story/india-today-41st-anniversary-science-technology-progress/1/834949.html India Today.in , Building up a nuclear muscle “India Today” 15/12/2016]
[[File: One of the five atomic weapons that were tested on May 11, 1998, being lowered into the test shaft , India Today .jpg| One of the five atomic weapons that were tested on May 11, 1998, being lowered into the test shaft , ''India Today'' |frame|500px]] 
1998

Pokhran-II

On May 13, 1998, Prime Minister Atal Behari Vajpayee announced India's new status as the world's sixth nuclear weapons armed power. Two days before the prime minister's announcement, on May 11, 'Operation Shakti' had been initiated. India had stunned-and somewhat alarmed-the world community with a series of five nuclear weapons tests. The weapons were of three different kinds-one fusion or thermonuclear weapon, two fission devices and two sub-kiloton devices-which indicated the flexibility and range of India's nuclear arsenal, slowly built up over the years. Pokhran-II was the first Indian test of a nuclear weapon since 1974. Post-1974, bomb technology had been placed on the backburner, until Pakistan came close to acquiring a nuclear weapon with Chinese assistance. Faced with the twin threats of a Chinese and Pakistani nuclear weapons arsenal and a closing global window-the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty was opened for signatures in 1996-the strategic community was left with no other option but to hit the test button.

== Kalam, atomic panel differed on Pokhran-II tests: AEC chief==
[https://epaper.timesgroup.com/olive/ODN/TimesOfIndia/shared/ShowArticle.aspx?doc=TOIDEL%2F2019%2F11%2F06&entity=Ar01412&sk=6C328CE6&mode=text  Srinivas Laxman, Nov 6, 2019: ''The Times of India'']


A hitherto unknown aspect of the 1998 nuclear tests at Pokhran was that Abdul Kalam, then chief of DRDO, differed with scientists at Atomic Energy Commission (AEC) about conducting a thermonuclear test (hydrogen bomb) over safety concerns.

The experiments, codenamed ‘Operation Shakti’ consisted of testing an atomic bomb, hydrogen bomb and small devices. The tests were held on on May 11 and May 13, 1998. The differences have been revealed for the first time by former AEC chief Anil Kakodkar in his autobiography, which has been co-authored with Suresh Gangotra of department of atomic energy (DAE).

Speaking to TOI on Tuesday, Kakodkar recalled that Kalam had expressed reservations about detonating a hydrogen bomb because he feared it could cause damage to the village of Khetolai, not far from the Pokhran weapon test site. Due to Kalam’s fears, Kakodkar said differences cropped up between DRDO and DAE regarding the testing of a hydrogen bomb.
In his autobiography, Kakodkar says Kalam asked him for a written undertaking that the hydrogen bomb test with a yield close to 45 kiloton would not cause any damage to the village, Khetolai. “I agreed to put my neck on the block and gave a duly signed written note…,” he writes. The test was carried out successfully and there was no damage to Khetolai .

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==Col. Kaushik’s details==
[https://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/india/camouflage-cricket-and-sandy-cues/articleshow/64991434.cms  Chethan Kumar, July 15, 2018: ''The Times of India'']
[[File: Members of 58 regiments with scientists.jpg|Members of 58 regiments with scientists <br/> From: [https://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/india/camouflage-cricket-and-sandy-cues/articleshow/64991434.cms  Chethan Kumar, July 15, 2018: ''The Times of India'']|frame|500px]]
[[File: One of the blasts site in Pokhran.jpg| One of the blasts site in Pokhran <br/> From: [https://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/india/camouflage-cricket-and-sandy-cues/articleshow/64991434.cms  Chethan Kumar, July 15, 2018: ''The Times of India'']|frame|500px]]
Pokhran II: 'Cricket to trick spy satellites, billiards to keep bombs safe'

It’s been 20 years since India stunned the world with Pokhran II. It wasn’t the fact that India had nuclear technology, but the realisation that India was able to conduct these tests without the rest of the world not having a clue as to what was going on in a remote location in Rajasthan’s Jaisalmer, despite having the place under constant satellite surveillance. In an exclusive interview with Chethan Kumar, Colonel Gopal Kaushik, formerly of the 58th Engineering regiment, talks about those groundbreaking tests. 

“Before we start, I want you to assure me that my location won’t be made public,” Colonel Gopal Kaushik (retired) said, sitting in his living room, somewhere in South India. Twenty years after the regiment he was commanding – the 58th Engineers Regiment – ensured the successful nuclear tests that put India on the map of nations with nuclear arms capability, he still has some untold stories. 


Code named Operation Shakti, the 1998 tests in Pokhran were the second time India tested its nuclear capability, following on from the failed efforts in 1995-96 when the country had to put off the tests owing to international pressure led by the US as details of the tests got leaked. 

The challenges, therefore, were many, unlike in 1974 when India under Indira Gandhi carried out the first test – code named ‘Smiling Buddha’. In 1974, India’s intention and capability were unknown, the test location preparations remained unknown, and the US did not have satellites that could keep an eye on developments around the world. 

But by the time Atal Bihari Vajpayee occupied the Prime Minister’s chair, India had demonstrated that it had nuclear capability—although the 1974 tests were officially never meant for weapons—and the entire world knew of Pokhran as the test site and powerful US satellites were already in the sky. 

So, when “Buddha Smiled” again on May 11 and 13 of 1998, there were a lot of stories. And, of the many stories around Operation Shakti, the most popular has been how India handed US’ Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) its significant defeat, keeping the spying agency completely in the dark. 

But some of the little known facts about the tests are here: The 58th Regiment that was responsible for carrying out the tests and keeping it a secret used cricket, practically a religion in India and billiards, to deceive spying satellites and saving the bomb, respectively. 

“The security of information and activities from satellites, spies on the ground and even the general public and our troops was paramount given the leaks earlier, but along with that we also had to create and maintain six shafts as opposed to one in 1974,” Kaushik said. 

About a hundred scientists, led by the former chairman of the atomic commission, R Chidambaram, former Bhabha Atomic Research Centre (BARC) chief Anil Kakodkar, former president and then Defence Research and Development Organisation (DRDO) chief APJ Abdul Kalam, and DRDO adviser K Santhanam, Kaushik and his men worked cautiously. 

The 58th Regiment had a vast high security area with periphery of outer fence measuring 24 km, with an intermediate fence of 11 km and inner fence of 6 km. Everything was on a need-to -know basis as they knew that they were being watched. 

From code names to decoy security posts and from carrying out work in the night and returning equipment to their spots before the satellites came back to track in the morning, the army was literally working in camouflage in extreme weather conditions—temperatures going up to 51 degrees Celsius in summers and minus three in the winters — in a place infested by snakes and scorpions. 

There were plenty of challenges that gave rise to several innovations and strategies, Kaushik said, as he collected water apples from his garden tree to offer. As he washed the apples, he said that one important strategy was to make the spies and satellites believe that everything they did was routine. 

“Among the things we did was routinely play cricket, although it isn’t really a troops sport like football or hockey. That was done purely to attract people to watch and mislead the satellites that nothing significant was happening in Pokhran,” Kaushik said. 

There were also several innovations. “One was to channelise the sub-soil water entering and getting collected in the shafts meant for the tests. There were some shafts that were already built as early 1981, and the 58th Regiment too built shafts in record time. In one of the older shafts, at about 100 metres inside we found a lot of groundwater collected. This meant that our men had to wear special raincoats to go inside and work, which was extremely difficult given the heat. The brackish water also meant corrosion of the metal used inside the shafts. We knew we couldn’t stop the water but we had to prevent it from raining inside. So, my company commander Major (now Brigadier) Suneeth Sharma and I executed a plan, which involved creating channels at every 100 metres of the 800-odd feet shaft. The water would then collect in the well below the canteen (a storage place built to hold the bombs) that had to be pumped out every day,” he said. 

But that didn’t solve the problem completely as the pumped out water could not be released onto the sand as it would have changed colour which would be observed by the satellites. 

“We couldn’t let the satellites see that we were pumping out water as it would indicate activity. Therefore, we had to bury a host of pipes under the sand to carry the pumped water away from the shafts and to sand dunes as they absorbed the water,” Kaushik said. 

There were several other innovations, but the one without which there would be no Operation Shakti, was the “Billiards Sticks Concept” 

With most things ready, it was time to fill up the shaft, up to the level of the canteen with sand. However, the team could not just drop sandbags from the mouth of the shaft as it could potentially damage the canteen, even the bomb, with its impact. So, in January 1998, Kaushik had conducted an experiment of lowering sand bags using a cage. 

“...We’d found that it took us about one minute to place one bag. We needed to place 6,000 bags, which meant it would have taken at least six or seven days if we worked normally and five days if we worked without breaks. We didn’t have that luxury as the satellites would pick it up. In 1995-96 the satellites had picked up half-a-day’s work,” he said. 

When the time arrived, Kaushik and Sharma came up with the “Billiards Sticks Concept”. “The name was given later by Santhanam, as what we did was inspired by the way cue sticks used to be arranged in Billiard parlours,” Kaushik recollected. 

What the team did was to arrange six metal pipes—filled with sand to make them strong—at the door of the canteen as a barricade allowing sand to be dropped from the mouth of the shaft. “We had barricaded the canteen with these pipes after the bombs were placed and then dropped the sand down. Without this, the Buddha wouldn’t have smiled again,” Kaushik said. 

A lot has happened since the Summer of 1998, but the stories from Pokhran in that year never fails to capture the audience.