NFC's Dr Ganguly likely to be next BARC chief

NFC's Dr Ganguly likely to be next BARC chief
D N MOORTY

MUMBAI, FEB 11: Indications are that Dr C Ganguly, the current chairman and chief executive of Nuclear Fuel Complex, Hyderabad, is slated to take over as director of BARC.

Dr Anil Kakodkar currently holds multiple responsibility. He is not only chairman of the Atomic Energy Commission and secretary of the Department of Atomic Energy, but continues to hold the title of director Bhabha Atomic Energy Centre (BARC). The question on everybody's lips is who is going to get the BARC post.

The success story of the Nuclear Power Corporation of India Limited which Dr V K Chaturvedi heads is largely because of the inputs derived from the BARC in terms of reactor and fuel technology and other DAE units like the Nuclear Fuel Complex located at Hyderabad and the Heavy Water Board. But above all NPC's confidence springs from a rare unity among the officers, engineers and scientists working in tandem. This was amply demonstrated when the Tarapur Union representatives categorically assured Dr Abdul Kalam on Saturday that they wuld go all out to see that the Tarapur's 540 Mwe units would be completed at least a year ahead of schedule.

However, if the NPC has to succeed inits new target of providing 40,000 Mwe to the nation by 2020 as desired by Dr Abdul Kalam, it is vital that this same atmosphere prevails at the BARC, which is known to be a divided house of discontent.

Kakodkar, observers say is looking not only for a man of high scientific ability but also a person who can re-energise the BARC and dispel the discontent and carry all its myriad departments together forward. More, he needs a person to oversee his pet project, the advanced heavy water reactors, which are a distinct improvement on the conventional PHWRs, in that it is being designed to exploit the thorium resources. Most sources agree that the current chairman and chief executive of the Nuclear Fuel Complex fits the bill. Not only has Ganguly infused new synergy into NFC, but his work in thorium and MOX fuels has been recognised.

Apart from that, at 52, Ganguly has still 13 years of service left taking 65 as the age of retirement for scientists of high calibre. Conventionally, the director of BARC has every chance to make it to the secretary DAE's post. Hence, observers say that it would be a matter of consistency and continutity in policy should he be appointed as BARC chief.

When this writer was at NFC recently, Kakodkar, who was in Hyderabad to attend the function of NFC getting ISO 9002 certificate, had to attend a meeting in Mumbai that he was supposed to chair but could not at the last moment do so. Instead of asking somebody from BARC in Mumbai to act in his stead, he dispatched Ganguly to chair the meeting in his place. ``This,'' said a senior scinetist who did not want to be named, ``is a clear pointer where Kakodkar's thinking is.''

Similarly, when another very senior person in the scientific cadre was questioned of how Kakodkar proposes to revamp BARC, he let out accidentally that, ``All these things have been gone into. With Ganguly coming, things will change at BARC.''