In the follow-up to Vajpayee's visit to New York, his Principal Secretary Brajesh Mishra has articulated the government's inclination to sign the CTBT in talks with the strategic community and his diplomatic counterparts in the governments of the UK, France and Russia. Vajpayee's statement can, therefore, be seen as a pulling back from the inclination conveyed to the international community in September and early October.

However, such as interpretation would be facile and inaccurate. The Indian government's stand is that it is not averse to signing the CTBT under conditions which guarantee India's security and freedom of options. Thoughnot formally linked, signing would also be based on an assessment that the US and its allies would withdraw all sanctions within some definite timeframe.

Vajpayee's statement that conditions are not conducive seems based on the latest assessment that the US and the other nuclear powers have given no clear indication about a quid pro quo in response to India's rational and practical approach post-Pokhran II. India's willingness to join the mainstream non-proliferation agenda is naturally predicated on vital security considerations and the international community being responsive to its political and technological needs.

Cogitation on whether to sign the CTBT continues across the power structure and public opinion. Discussions have tended to be intensely technical and procedural. Maybe it is worth while to go back to the basics. Signing the CTBT, and our nuclear policy itself, should involve an assessment of the objectives of our nuclear tests, the ingredients of the international reactions, the way weshould cope with them (which involves decisions on the CTBT and FMCT) and, most important, a definitional exercise in what considerations should underpin our future nuclear defence strategies.

The macro-level objectives of the Shakti tests were to test, acquire and confirm India's nuclear weapons capacities to cope with the nuclear strategic environment and potential threats. Second, the aim is to prevent the institutional perpetuation of the unfair hegemony of the five existing nuclear weapon powers and an international strategic order based on discrimination and inequality between the nuclear weapon powers and all the other countries of the world.

India has succeeded in achieving both these aims but she now faces the consequences. The-re is an almost fanatical opposition to giving India and Pakistan legal recognition as "nuclear weapon states". There is intense pressure on India to unconditionally sign all the discriminatory international non-proliferation regimes and to pull back from upgrading itsmissile defence systems.

There is an insistence on India not only participating in FMCT negotiations but, while participating in these negotiations, on moving away from its negotiating stance on the CTBT in 1995-96. Incremental sanctions remain in place against India acquiring sophisticated technologies. All this was backed up with economic sanctions, which have been only partially removed by the US.

It is interesting that even the governments of France and Russia, while generally accepting India's rationale and motivation, have conveyed that they cannot be responsive to India's needs unless it abides by the nuclear powers' stipulations. This is the message received at official interactions with the US, France, UK and Russia. No discussions have been held at all with China.

Important countries such as Japan and Germany and multilateral entities like the European Union and the Non-Aligned Movement remain critical of India even if they do not approve of the monopolistic hegemony of the nuclear weaponstates. Coping with this international reaction involves an assessment of the factors which should influence our future nuclear defence strategies, because the way we manage the negative international response will influence our nuclear defence policies.

First and foremost, there should be no diminishing or erosion of our nuclear and missile technological capacities because of international pressure. Second, we should ensure political and procedural conditions, both domestically and internationa- lly, which would enable us to sustain the capacities we have achieved and to improve upon them in response to the changing security environment in our region and future challenges. We should become a signatory to the CTBT or the future FMCT subject to these two fundamental considerations.

If, for short-term strategic and tactical purposes, signing the CTBT is considered useful, we should carefully ascertain its procedural and technological implications on our confirmed nuclear weapon capacities. We should be surethat the restrictions that the CTBT would apply to us, even if non-discriminatory, do not affect our freedom of options to maintain adequate defence capacities in the future.

It would be illogical and illusory to expect that signing the CTBT and other related regimes would automatically end restrictions on export of sophisticated technologies to us or of all economic sanctions. Access to sophisticated technologies and the removal of all sanctions is likely to happy only under two circumstances. Either we sign the CTBT unconditionally and then cap our nuclear capacities. Frankly, the nuclear weapon powers would be most happy if we rolled back and eliminated these abilities.

Or we remain firm about what we have achieved and prove credibly that we have the grit to survive sanctions. Over time, the futility of maintaining sanctions, combined with the economic dimensions of a cooperative relationship with India, may result in sanctions fading away. Clearly we should opt for the second course. We should notargue for or expect a link between signing the CTBT and removal of sanctions.

French special envoy Gerard Errera was in New Delhi in October. Former Prime Minister I.K. Gujral was in Japan in October to explain India's stand on various issues. There has been some parallelism in the Indian and Pakistani stands on nuclear issues at the UN General Assembly and Security Council debates in October. Senior figures from the Indian strategic and academic establishments visited the US in October and November. Jaswant Singh is to have the next round of talks with Storbe Talbott in Rome on November 19.

India's intense diplomatic effort to get back to a normal equation with the international community after acquiring nuclear weapons status seems to be on course. Only two governing terms of reference should be kept in mind. We should speak in one voice to the world at large. We should not let any aspect of our security become hostage due to immediate pressures or short-term tactical considerations.