"If it is going to cause harm to our health, what should we do? You don't eat something just because it is served to you," he told a TV channel.

"What is the other alternative," Kakodkar countered when asked whether the deal would be kept aside if it is in a form which is unacceptable to India.

"Let us finish the cooking process (of the nuclear deal), taste it then see whether it is good or bad," he said.

Asked what would India do in case the cooked meal is not appetising, Kakodkar said, "then we don't eat it. If it is appetising we will eat it."

Kakodkar said the US disclosures on the nuclear deal do not take away anything India wanted and there was ‘adequate protection’ for its strategic programme in the civil nuclear deal with Washington.

He said India knew about the letter written by the US State Department in January to Tom Lantos, the then Chairman of the House Foreign Affairs Committee, but was caught unawares by its release.

"But now they have released the document. A quick reading tells me that it actually doesn't take away anything whatever we have been saying here in India before," he said.