Radiation death in India raises nuclear safety concerns

The radiation-related death of a scrap metal worker has raised concerns over nuclear safety in India, at a time when the Asian power is wooing foreign players to its $150 billion civilian nuclear market.

Matthias Williams

Authorities have launched a probe into the unauthorized disposal of a disused machine from the chemistry department of Delhi University, which contained the radioactive material cobalt-60 and ended up in a scrap metal hub in the capital.

A man died in hospital from exposure last week, in a case a member of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) was quoted as saying was the most serious worldwide since 2006.

The death raised concerns over the handling of nuclear material in India at a time when the ruling Congress party is trying to push through legislation in parliament to help foreign players access its lucrative nuclear energy market.

India, one of a handful of countries which refuses to sign the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty, inked a landmark civilian nuclear agreement with United States in 2008, taking it out of three decades of nuclear isolation.

"As a historic accord between India and the U.S. takes our country forward on its path to nuclear commerce, the ability to effect safeguards is going to be critical," wrote the Financial Express newspaper in an editorial this week.

"Against this backdrop, the first radiation-related death of a common man provides a wakeup-call that must be taken very seriously."

The government is due to introduce a bill in parliament by the end of this week, the last week in the current session, which underwrites the compensation liability for foreign firms in the case of industrial accidents.

The Communist Party of India (Marxist), a former government ally and vocal critic of the nuclear deal and the pending nuclear liability bill, raised the worker's death in parliament.

Safety standards are a sensitive issue in India, where a gas leak in a Union Carbide factory killed thousands a quarter of a century ago in one of the world's worst industrial accidents.

Memories of the disaster have helped shape the debate around the current nuclear bill, which had been shelved after protests by the opposition who said it favored private foreign companies.

French and Russian nuclear firms plan to set up in India, and New Delhi has offered to tender construction of two plants to U.S.-based firms GE-Hitachi and Westinghouse Electric, a subsidiary of Japan's Toshiba Corp.

Om Pal Singh, secretary of India's Atomic Energy Regulatory Board, which is looking into the death, told Reuters the incident should be seen in the context of similar scares in Europe and the United States and not only in terms of Indian regulation.

He said Indian authorities were taking measures to reduce the risk of nuclear exposure, such as scanners at port checks for material coming from abroad, or giving scrap dealers the equipment and training to check radiation levels.

"My feeling is that, with time, these incidents are decreasing, and maybe after some more time, the chances will become almost negligible. More and more people are getting sensitized," he said by phone.

"A lot of measures are being taken, and have been taken, to prevent such instances."

The apparent ease with which radioactive material could be disposed unsupervised has also raised fears such material could fall into the hands of militants to make so-called "dirty bombs".

Ajai Sahni, Executive Director, Institute for Conflict Management, said nuclear security in India is concentrated on high-profile installations such as power plants and research facilities, but less attention was paid to low-end applications.

But he said there was scant evidence of militants trying to get hold of nuclear material from discarded equipment because the process is complicated: "The handling of such materials is extremely problematic," he said.