The real question is whether it will also sink the emerging strategic alliance between the United States and India -- intended by both countries to be a keystone of Asia's security architecture in the coming century.

The revolt by the scientists has been simmering for months. They never liked the deal, reckoning that India was selling itself and its nuclear capabilities too cheaply, and putting too high a price on the return to nuclear respectability that the deal embodies.

India, which has never signed the non-proliferation treaty, has been a nuclear pariah, excluded from the usual technical cooperation between the nuclear powers in the Nuclear Suppliers' Group and thus also from access to key supplies like enriched uranium.

In return for bringing India back into the nuclear club, the United States obtained a number of important concessions. India agreed to open most (14 out of 22) of its reactors and nuclear research labs to international inspection and to abide by the terms of the U.S. deal "in perpetuity."

India's top nuclear scientists, known as the G8, have now publicly declared: "We find that the Indo-U.S. deal, in the form approved by the U.S. House of Representatives, infringes on our independence for carrying out indigenous research and development in nuclear science & technology.

"Our R&D should not be hampered by external supervision or control, or by the need to satisfy any international body. Research and technology development are the sovereign rights of any nation. This is especially true when they concern strategic national defense and energy self-sufficiency."

This statement by the scientists has provided cover for the political opponents of the deal to rally against it. The Communist Party allies of Prime Minister Singh's government, guided as much by anti-Americanism as by nuclear concerns, are to the fore, but Congress party leader Sonya Gandhi is now also wavering, and the BJP opposition party have seen a chance to hand the Singh government a stinging defeat.

The opposition to the deal has been made easier by the way in which the U.S. Congress tinkered with the initial terms of the deal as the price of their own support. They did so in response to strong pressure from the domestic and international lobbies, who argue (with some justice) that the deal drives a coach and horses through the terms of the NPT and sets a dangerous precedent -- just as the world is trying to rein in Iran's nuclear ambitions.

The scientists have further support inside India's national security community. India inhabits a dangerous neighborhood, with Russia and China and Pakistan all nuclear powers and Iran close to joining them. A lot of generals, diplomats, intelligence officials and senior advisers warn that the deal could inhibit India's freedom of strategic action.

A new memorandum being circulated among Indian nuclear scientists, claiming to rebut the government's defense of the deal, and obtained by United Press International, says: "Following the passage of the Bill through the two Houses of Representatives, in the event of a nuclear test carried out by India which has not been "allowed" by the U.S., the president will seek to prevent the transfer of technology or materials from other governments participating in the NSG or from any other source.

India could in effect be denied fuel from any country if the U.S. withdrew. Worse still, our bureaucrats seem to have forgotten that in-perpetuity agreements without an exit clause also invite long term sanctions and invite worse forms of 'nuclear apartheid' than currently exist as a result of being outside the NPT fence."

The Indian scientists are trying to protect the crown jewels of India's nuclear program; its own design of new fast-breeder reactors and its pioneering use of thorium (of which India has a large share of the world's reserves) as a nuclear fuel. And they claim that the new terms to the deal inserted by U.S. Congress leaves these technologies open to inspectors, both American and international, through the International Atomic Energy Agency.

"It has now emerged that not only will IAEA safeguards apply, but Indian entities will attract separate monitoring by three independent U.S. agencies," says the new memo from the scientists. "Such a situation is obviously completely unacceptable," they add.

Will this unholy alliance between nuclear scientists, anti-American leftists and nationalist security officials be enough to stop the deal? Probably not, although it will certainly delay and complicate it. Prime Minister Singh has negotiated his way around similar opposition in the past, and even the BJP opposition party agrees with the basic Singh strategy that India should cement its strategic alliance with the United States.

The bottom line for India is that the country fears being left standing dangerously alone and vulnerable on a railway line, with two trains rushing upon it from different directions. One train is the rise of China and the other is Islamic extremism, and India justifiably fears being run over by each of them simultaneously.

That is why both the last BJP government and the current Congress-led coalition have sought to end fifty years of Indian neutrality and forge a strategic relationship with the United States. That decision has been made long since. The question now is the price India is prepared to pay to secure it, and how far the United States will go to meet the Indian concerns, while crafting a deal that can get the support of the other nuclear powers in the Nuclear Suppliers' Group.

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