"Shakti is successful," said the excited voice at the far end of the line. It was A.P.J. Abdul Kalam, from the Alpha Range near Pokharan. `Shakti' was the code for the three simultaneous nuclear tests carried out moments ago at Pokharan.

"There was jubilation that we had demonstrated not just the spine to tell the world, but the technological statement that went with it," said a government official. The small group at 7, Race Course Road had enough to cheer about. They had taken India into therestricted circle of nuclear weapons states, although the notice at the door said "No Entry".

The tests of May 11 and May 13 were the culmination of a closely guarded operation. Without much of a hint, the government was able to test five nuclear bombs. "How we did it was by following the simple intelligence principle of could know, must know, need know, need not know," said a member of the core group. "We decided on the status to be applied to various members of the government, chiselled down as many names as we could," he added.

As far as the resolve to test was concerned, "The decision to induct nuclear weapons was stated in simple language in our manifesto of 1996 and that of 1998. It is even there in the National Agenda for Governance that we put together with our allies," said a member of the Bharatiya Janata Party's (BJP) foreign affairs cell. "Our intentions were always stated, it was only a question of timing as to when we actually test the bombs and induct them into our arsenal."

Did the BJPwant to test when it came to power for the first time? The Prime Minister's political adviser, Pramod Mahajan, said he was not aware of "how close" the BJP came to nuclear tests during its 13-day rule. "This is despite the fact that I was defence minister. Maybe the Prime Minister had thought of it, but I did not get to know," he said.

(One version is that while Vajpayee was keen on the tests during his first term, bureaucrats such as Cabinet Secretary Surinder Singh and the Prime Minister's Principal Secretary were of the view that the Government should prove its strength in Parliament before taking such a decision.)

The first suggestion to actually weaponise the nuclear systems was probably made in January, when Vajpayee, the BJP's prime minister-designate, broke the routine of election campaigning and was in Delhi for rest. He is believed to have discussed the nuclear issue with his closest political colleagues, L.K. Advani and Jaswant Singh. Judging the pulse of the election rallies, the possibilityof government formation loomed large then, and the key issues were already being thrashed out, although only as tenets.

The first suggestion that something was brewing can be traced back to the induction of Dr Raja Ramanna, on March 29, into the Atomic Energy Regulatory Board (AERB). While the AERB only supervises the safety aspects of the civilian nuclear programme, and has no functional responsibility over the weapons site, the fact that the architect of the May 18, 1974 test was being given an influential appointment was not lost on many. "It was clearly a case of bestowing a certain status on one of the key figures of 1974, and it sent a message across the board," said a military observer.

The notices to prepare for the tests were already going out by then, first to R. Chidambar-am, Chairman of the Atomic Energy Commission (AEC), and Kalam, Scientific Advisor to the Defence Minister and the chief of Defence Research and Development Organisation (DRDO).

The two eminent scientists put together theirspecialised teams to undertake the assignment. While the nuclear scientists got activated at the Bhabha Atomic Research Centre (BARC), the DRDO side was working assiduously at the Defence Laboratory Jodhpur (DLJ). The DRDO's contribution was to prepare the test site and DLJ's to provide all administrative facilities. And working under the DRDO was one the regiments from the Army's Corps of Engineers. "It was fortunate for this Madras Sapper regiment to have been given the responsibility, for they had only just recently arrived in station. I feel sorry for the previous regiment, who worked so hard to keep the site area functional, but only to move before their hard work could have been actually recorded in history," said a scientist who was at the testing site, and was one of the key players in the operation.

"These boys are the unsung heroes of our programme. Over all these years they have kept the site functional, despite what weather and brackish water does to equipment here," the scientist added.

Themaintenance of the sites falls under the responsibility of the various engineer regiments posted in this desert region. And they were also involved in the preparation of the aborted December 1995 test when P.V. Narasimha Rao was the prime minister.

This time it was not going to be a repeat of 1995. As already detailed by The Indian Express, the government did its homework, or rather groundwork, when it came to dealing with the satellites. What they also did was to restrict the spread of information regarding the tests. Those with the knowledge of the impending tests were still the two political friends of the PM and a couple of key aides. The number of those in the know, and involved, remained limited until the last phase. Even while the green signal had been given to the scientists to prepare for tests, the date was not fixed. All that was happening remained under wraps. Work on the site proceeded on a very subtle and careful course. What, however, proved to be the catalyst to giving the final sanctionwere two significant events in Pakistan.

On April 6, the Ghauri, the North Korean cloned intermediate range ballistic missile was test-fired by Pakistan. And following that, on April 17, the Pakistani Minister for Information, Mushahid Hussain, made an unprecedented visit to the Muridke camp of Markaz Dawawal Irshad, the parent organisation of the Lashkar-e-Taiba, one of the most active terrorist groups fighting in Jammu and Kashmir. "It was too much of a coincidence for a massacre to take place that very night, at Prankot-Machal Gala in Udhampur district," said a key member of the government. "The language employed by their Information Minister was repulsive and provocative, to say the least. It was the language of hate," he added.

The continuing Sino-Pak nexus for significant transfers of restricted technologies and the beligerence with which Islamabad greeted the new government in Delhi were the final determinants. "We finally decided enough is enough. Try as we might, but the world still does notcare. So we decided to do what was in our national security interests, since there was little we were achieving by being timid," said the official. When the order was sent out to the scientists to detonate the nuclear weapons, a major hitch developed. The President was leaving for a long foreign tour, and it would be impossible to test while he was not on Indian shores. There had to be a delay. In the meantime, the circle of the informed expanded, with the inclusion of the Foreign Secretary K. Raghunath, since he and his officers would ultimately be doing the fire-fighting. It is believed he knew of the decision and the date before his talks with US officials in Washington.

On May 9, the Defence Minister and the three service chiefs were called in to the Prime Minister's Office, and briefed about the impending tests. The Army chief had to be in the picture since two of his battalions, Guards and Grenadiers, were to be deployed for outer perimeter security, and keeping the villagers in the safety zones."They were excited," said the official.

With the President arriving on May 10, the D-Day was finally fixed for May 11. On the evening of his arrival, Rashtrapati Bhavan had a visitor in the Prime Minister. He had come to inform the Supreme Commander of the Armed Forces that `India was going to conduct a nuclear test at 8 a.m. the next day'.

"So you see, the testing date falling on Buddha Purnima is simply a coincidence. And we had planned for the morning since it would have been nighttime in the US, and whatever images their satellites were sending would only be piling up. But unfortunately that morning there was a shift in the wind direction, and so we had to keep it in the afternoon," said the official.

There were no further hitches. So Kalam called 7, Race Course Road to confirm the success.

(With inputs from Ritu Sarin)