In 1974 India joined the elite roster of nuclear world powers when it exploded its first nuclear bomb. But the technological progress that facilitated that feat was set in motion many decades before, as India sought both independence from the British and respect from the larger world. Over the course of the twentieth century, India metamorphosed from a marginal place to a serious hub of technological and scientific innovation. It is this tale of transformation that Robert S. Anderson recounts in Nucleus and Nation.

Tracing the long institutional and individual preparations for India’s first nuclear test and its consequences, Anderson begins with the careers of India’s renowned scientists—Meghnad Saha, Shanti Bhatnagar, Homi Bhabha, and their patron Jawaharlal Nehru—in the first half of the twentieth century before focusing on the evolution of the large and complex scientific community—especially Vikram Sarabhi—in the later part of the era. By contextualizing Indian debates over nuclear power within the larger conversation about modernization and industrialization, Anderson hones in on the thorny issue of the integration of science into the framework and self-reliant ideals of Indian nationalism. In this way, Nucleus and Nation is more than a history of nuclear science and engineering and the Indian Atomic Energy Commission; it is a unique perspective on the history of Indian nationhood and the politics of its scientific community.

Preface  

Acknowledgments  

Note on Spelling, Photographs, and Currencies  

Map of Atomic Energy, Space, and Defense Research Centers  

Atomic Energy and Space Research Establishments in 1974  

one  Introduction  

two  Building Scientific Careers in the 1920s: Saha and Bhatnagar, from London to Allahabad and Lahore  

three  The Bangalore Affair, 1935–38: Scientists and Conflict around C. V. Raman  

four  Imagining a Scientific State: Nehru, Scientists, and Political Planning, 1938–42  

five  Homi Bhabha Confronts Science in India, 1939–44  

six  Indian Scientists Engage the Empire: The CSIR and the Idea of Atomic and Industrial Power  

seven  Saha, Bhatnagar, and Bhabha in Contrast, 1944–45  

eight  Restless in Calcutta: Meghnad Saha’s Institution-Building  

nine  Bhatnagar Builds His Chain of Laboratories and Steps Upward  

ten  Bhabha Builds His Institute in Bombay  

eleven  The Politics of the Early Indian Atomic Energy Committee and Commission  

twelve  Scientific Networks, Nehru, and Defense Research and Development  

thirteen  A Scientist in the Political System: Professor Saha Goes to Parliament, 1952–55  

fourteen  The Cabinet and Scientific Advice in the 1950s and 1960s: Bhabha, Atomic Energy, and Scientific and Industrial Research  

fifteen  A New Scientific Elite: Sarabhai Builds Another Atomic Energy Network, 1966–71  

sixteen  A Day in the Life of Two Research Institutes in Bombay and Calcutta  

seventeen  Governance, Management, and Working Conditions in Research Institutes Founded by Saha and Bhabha  

eighteen  Governance and Influence in the Research Institutes Bhatnagar Built  

nineteen  Articulating Science and Technology Policy for Indira Gandhi’s Cabinet  

twenty  Building a High-Technology Economy through Atomic Energy, Space, and Electronics  

twenty-one  Nuclear Expectations and Resistance in India’s Political Economy  

twenty-two  Scientists in India’s War over Self-Reliance  

twenty-three  The First Bomb Test: Its Context, Reception, and Consequences in India  

twenty-four  The Scientific Community, the State of Emergency, and After, 1975–80  

twenty-five  Conclusions  

Chronology of Events  

Biographical Notes  

Notes  

Index