Why Adrian Levy's Scary Claims on India's Nuclear Security Practices Are Wide Off the Mark

Are Adrian Levy’s reports on India’s nuclear safety and security practices based on facts or are they merely promoting sensationalism?

A well-known British journalist Adrian Levy recently published a series of reports with the US-based non-profit media organisation called Centre for Public Integrity, which levelled allegations of laxity and misconduct in India’s nuclear safety and security practices. Such was the impact of Levy’s report on uranium mining in India that the country’s National Human Rights Commission (NHRC) took a suo motu cognisance of the issue.

Besides, it also called for reports within two weeks from concerned agencies such as the Department of Atomic Energy (DAE), Uranium Corporation of India Ltd (UCIL) and the government of Jharkhand. In a statement issued by the NHRC, Justice D. Murugesan, observed that-

….the contents of the press report, if true, raise a serious issue of violation of rights to health of the workers and residents, besides damage to the environment, flora and fauna….

India’s nuclear agencies were quick to issue rebuttals and rebuffed Levy’s allegations as a ‘deliberate distortion of facts’. Nevertheless, the gravity of Levy’s claims calls for a serious dismantling of the uneasy propositions over India’s nuclear power programme. To begin with, the assertions made by Levy in his reports are devoid of any factual or scientific accuracy and rigour.

For instance, Levy’s contentions regarding the impact from uranium mining on the public and environment are deeply flawed, as they ignore years of scientific research conducted in these areas. A large number of validated and peer-reviewed studies have been published on public health and the environmental impact of uranium mining in India.

At Jaduguda mines, there have been at least four separate health surveys conducted by experts, including physicians and scientists, many of them from outside the Department of Atomic Energy (DAE). These studies have repeatedly confirmed that workers and residents near these facilities are almost as healthy as the general population in the region. The same is also true for people residing near the nuclear plants in the country.

A report by doctors and specialists from the Bhabha Atomic Research Center (BARC), UCIL, the government of Bihar and Tata Main Hospital in 1998 concluded that the disease pattern prevailing in the local population cannot be ascribed to exposure to low levels of radiation. The health survey of Chatkidih and Dungridih villages, which are close to the UCIL tailing ponds, conducted in 2001-02, observed no genetic abnormalities caused by radiation. Similarly, another health survey in three different villages around the tailing ponds found the health status of the people to be almost normal.

Given the large variety of other factors that cause cancer and congenital anomalies, including malnutrition and poor socio-economic conditions in tribal areas, the impact of low-level radiation on health is statistically insignificant for villages around Jaduguda.

The allegations of groundwater contamination as well as radioactive waste dumping in Subarnarekha river, too, appear to be far from any truth. An Environmental Survey Laboratory of the Bhabha Atomic Research Centre (BARC) has been operational at Jaduguda since 1965. The ESL has been meticulously monitoring various environmental matrices, including water samples from the treatment plant, at the discharge point, and at various points a few kilometres downstream as well as groundwater samples from wells and tubewells around the UCIL installations.

The laboratory also continuously monitors radiation levels at various locations, including the tailing ponds, for the slightest increase in background radiation using advanced techniques and equipment. The ESL experts have published the survey results in many internationally acclaimed scientific journals as well as in the proceedings of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), and these show no significant increase in the levels of environmental radon or gamma radiation around the uranium mining and milling complex at Jaduguda. Levy seems to deliberately ignore such facts and instead relied on the information provided by organisations/individuals of questionable antecedents, which requires validation.

In his report on the safety of the Kudankulam nuclear plant (KKNPP), Levy once again chose to ignore that the Russian VVER-1000 MWe Pressurised Water Reactor at Kudankulam is an established reactor design worldwide and includes some of the most advanced safety features such as passive heat removal system and core catcher which brings it to the Generation III+ category of reactors. Levy, instead, chose to base his story on the allegations of use of low-quality equipment for setting up the VVER-1000 reactors at Kudankulam.

Stories about low-quality equipment have been found to be utterly baseless. India’s atomic regulatory board has duly noted in this regard that all the equipment and components installed at KKNPP have passed through various stages of a stringent Quality Assurance Process and that there is no compromise in the quality of the components supplied to KKNPP from Atomstroyexport (ASE) of the Russian Federation.

The concerns raised by Levy about the vulnerability of the KKNPP reactors to tsunami-induced flooding, as had transpired at Fukushima, Japan, are equally fictitious. The Nuclear Power Corporation of India Ltd (NPCIL) has publicly said on numerous occasions that KKNPP reactors are built 8.7 metres above the mean sea-level and that there are adequate design safety features to protect them in the event of flooding. As regards doubts surrounding the autonomy of India’s atomic energy regulatory board (AERB), which Levy has referred to several times, it is worthwhile to point out the recent judgement of Kerala High Court dated 21 October 2015. The High Court categorically stated that:

There is no reason to doubt the independence of the said organisation. In fact, the power to be exercised by the Central Government under the Act is delegated to the Board.

Among others, the Board has eminent specialists as members are drawn from academic and research institutions, industries and Government agencies such as the Ministry of Environment and Forests, Central Electricity Authority, Central Boilers Board etc.

Levy’s report on nuclear security situation in India, too, is full of insinuations. He lists several incidents of nuclear security lapses some of which are consequential while most others are largely inconsequential. Except for the incidents at Kalpakkam & Kaiga power stations, most other incidents of so-called nuclear security significance that Levy has listed do not warrant serious consideration.

Over the years, India has learned vital lessons from handling a myriad of internal security challenges, and nuclear security has been accorded significant prominence in terms of putting in place highly reliable technological and organizational systems.

Levy, however, erroneously links the occurrence of such incidents to India’s consistent poor ranking in the global nuclear materials security index prepared by the US-based Nuclear Threat Initiative (NTI). It is by now well-established that NTI’s methodology for the evaluation of nuclear security suffers from serious flaws and that it does not take into account certain country-specific practices.

For instance, the AERB has stipulated stringent nuclear security requirements and responsibilities in its various codes and guidelines. On physical protection and nuclear security aspects, AERB has issued a specific manual on the nuclear security of NPPs, all of which is not given weightage in the NTI index ranking and, therefore, cannot be relied upon as a measure of nuclear security conditions in India.

Finally, Levy’s report on the new secret military complex in Karnataka too was banal. The existence of this facility has been known since 2010. The facility caters to the need for enriching uranium for both civilian and military programmes. Levy, however, falsely propagated the idea that the facility will accelerate India’s thermonuclear weapons build-up and unsettle Pakistan and China.

Several international reports have confirmed that India’s nuclear arsenal has grown very slowly over the years, and any specific regional threat does not drive the country’s nuclear programme. Pakistan, on the contrary, has been building fissile material stockpile at an alarming pace to match in vain India’s massive conventional military might.

In sum, to cast aspersions and denigrate India’s nuclear programme, Levy either relied on misleading inputs or half-baked truths devoid of any scientific and factual accuracy. Levy’s reports overlook facts about world-class safety and security practises enforced in India’s nuclear facilities. His mischievous attempts at raising false alarms to India’s neighbours and the international community about the so-called new military facilities too falls flat on its face.

Not possessing any new information or perspective, Levy’s has therefore resorted to mere sensationalism that barely stands the test of any serious scrutiny. Such shoddy attempts are unlikely to dampen India’s prospects for the advancement of its nuclear power programme in the coming decades.