First it was Kazakhstan, then Namibia and now Mongolia. In its quest for obtaining fuel for its nuclear power plants, India has been reaching out to every possible country that has some uranium resources and is willing to sell it to New Delhi.

Monday’s civil nuclear cooperation agreement with Mongolia is the sixth that New Delhi has signed since the 45-member Nuclear Suppliers’ Group formalised India’s re-entry into international nuclear commerce last year after 34 years of sanctions. Only three of them are with established nuclear powers — United States, France and Russia.

The Memorandum of Understanding signed with Mongolia falls into a pattern. Countries like Namibia, Mongolia and Kazakhstan are likely to be more reliable sources of uranium as compared to some other nations which are still reluctant to do nuclear business with India. In fact, despite the waiver New Delhi earned from the NSG, Canada and Australia, the world’s topmost and third biggest producer of uranium respectively, have so far refused to engage in nuclear trade with India citing domestic compulsions.

With the domestic supplies of uranium unable to keep pace with the demand, many of the nuclear reactors in India, till a few months back, were forced to run at half their capacities.

Sources in the Department of Atomic Energy told The Indian Express that “multi-sourcing” was at the heart of India’s strategy of obtaining enough nuclear fuel for its existing and rapidly expanding nuclear power generation capacity. It was important for India’s nuclear power sector to remain insulated from the whims of individual nations, they said.

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