Undermining Nuclear Safety

The Atomic Energy Regulatory Board (AERB) was created on November 15, 1983 through a gazette notification (No. 25/2/83-ER) signed by the then Secretary, Department of Atomic Energy (DAE), Dr.Raja Ramanna. Among other things, the AERB was empowered to lay down safety standards, frame rules and regulations in regard to public and worker safety under the provisions of the Atomic Energy Act, 1962 and enforce their compliance in all DAE and non-DAE installations.

The AERB has been attempting to meet these responsibilities to the best of its abilities since then, within the constraints of a serious lack of independence from the DAE and a shortage of adequate technical manpower of its own. But, through an Office Me morandum dated April 25, 2000 Dr.R.Chidambaram, the present Secretary of the DAE, has ordered that the regulatory and safety functions at the Bhabha Atomic Research Centre (BARC) and its facilities, exercised at present by the AERB, will henceforth be ca rried out through an "Internal Safety Committee Structure" to be constituted by the Director of the BARC. The independent safety assurance and regulation has thus been made the responsibility of the same people who manage these installations, defeating the very principle of unbiased external scrutiny, which is at the core of any such regulation.

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