Modi government yields to the U.S. pressure; open up a strategic and crucial sector like nuclear energy to private and foreign multinational companies.
Groundxero | December 18
The Union government has pushed through a far-reaching overhaul of India’s nuclear energy regime, opening the strategic sector to private and foreign multinational corporations while diluting long-standing safety and liability safeguards.
The Sustainable Harnessing and Advancement of Nuclear Energy for Transforming India (SHANTI) Bill, 2025 was introduced in the Lok Sabha on December 16 and passed the very next day, brushing aside Opposition demands for scrutiny by a parliamentary standing committee. The Bill cleared the Rajya Sabha on December 18, paving the way for it to become law.
The SHANTI Bill marks a decisive rupture in India’s nuclear history. It repeals both the Atomic Energy Act, 1962 and the Civil Liability for Nuclear Damage (CLND) Act, 2010, fundamentally restructuring the sector. For the first time since Independence, private Indian companies, joint ventures and foreign entities will be allowed to build, own, operate and decommission nuclear power plants, ending the monopoly of the state-run Nuclear Power Corporation of India Ltd (NPCIL).
Until now, civilian nuclear activities in India were kept under strict public control because of their strategic significance and catastrophic risks. The SHANTI Bill replaces this framework with a profit-driven licensing regime, opening large parts of the nuclear value chain—mining of atomic minerals, fuel fabrication, reactor construction, plant operation and decommissioning—to private operators. While the government cites rising energy demand and fiscal constraints, the shift effectively privatises risk while socialising potential damage.
The government retains control over sensitive areas such as nuclear fuel production, heavy water manufacturing and radioactive waste management, citing national security and non-proliferation concerns. However, critics argue that this does little to offset the sweeping transfer of operational control to private capital.
Most controversially, the Bill dismantles India’s nuclear liability framework. By repealing the CLND Act, it removes supplier liability altogether, making plant operators solely responsible for compensation in the event of an accident. Even this liability is also capped and linked to installed capacity rather than the scale of damage, with graded limits designed to reduce “investment uncertainty”.
The Bill also abolishes the operator’s statutory right of recourse against reactor suppliers, shielding manufacturers from responsibility for defective design or faulty equipment. As a result, the financial burden of nuclear accidents is shifted squarely onto victims and the State.
Since the CLND Act was enacted in 2010, multinational reactor suppliers—particularly from the United States and France—have refused to invest in India, objecting to supplier liability clauses. Washington has repeatedly pressed New Delhi to amend the law, and the SHANTI Bill is widely seen as the Modi government yielding to this pressure. Even the existing liability cap of Rs 1,500 crore per incident, with a matching government contribution, was a political compromise under the 2008 Indo–US Civil Nuclear Agreement. Disasters such as Fukushima, which cost over $200 billion, have not deterred foreign suppliers from demanding near-total immunity.
The Bill also grants private nuclear operators wide latitude in setting electricity tariffs, effectively removing regulatory oversight. Critics describe this as a double bonanza for corporations—freedom from both meaningful liability and price regulation—underscoring the BJP-led NDA government’s pro-corporate policy orientation.
Notably, the SHANTI Bill is silent on labour safety standards, occupational disease compensation and long-term health surveillance for nuclear workers and affected communities.
Opposition to the Bill has begun to emerge. The National Coordination Committee of Electricity Employees & Engineers (NCCOEEE), the Platform of Central Trade Unions and the Samyukt Kisan Morcha (SKM) have demanded its immediate withdrawal.
In a joint statement, the organisations called for the restoration of stringent liability provisions, including the operator’s right of recourse; the establishment of a genuinely independent nuclear regulatory authority; stronger environmental and labour protections; and clear parliamentary oversight over foreign involvement in nuclear activities.
They have announced nationwide demonstrations at workplaces and villages on December 23, 2025, against what they describe as a “draconian” nuclear law, alongside protests against electricity privatisation and the Draft Electricity (Amendment) Bill, 2025. Conventions and rallies are planned across the country in January and February 2026.