Stroke of the Midnight Hour when the world sleeps India will awake to life and Freedom the year is 1947 and India had just gotten Independence and while we were taking our first breath of freedom on the other side the world had just witnessed the most horrific war in world history four years of bloody hell Hitler has committed a crime not only.
Against Poland but against the whole human right an estimated 6 million Jews were killed during World War II World War II was fought on six of the seven continents 50 million people perish it’s the largest land invasion in history and the event that shook the world was when the United States of America put an end to World War II by.
Dropping two nuclear bombs in Hiroshima and Nagasaki a short time ago an American airplane dropped one bomb on Hiroshima the temperature at the center of the bomb reached 120 million de 70,000 people are killed the war ended but not the dying and the entire world was shocked to see how.
These two nuclear bombs turned two entire cities to dust within just a few minutes and the effects of radiation were so devastating that they astounded the most powerful nations in the world that day every single leader in the world realized that if mankind comes to an end nuclear weapons will be the reason for it but you know what while.
The entire world saw nuclear bombs As Weapons of Mass Destruction one man saw it as an opportunity this man wasn’t an American or a Russian he was an Indian who went by the name homie jahangir Baba it shows the absolute necessity of finding some new source of energy if the light of our civilization is not to be extinguished because we are burned out.
Our fuel reserves to those who made Ry remarks about a cow dang economy wishing to go in for nuclear energy long before this assessment was made Dr P had visualized a nuclear power program for India Today 8 and 1 half years after the Institute was founded because the real thing that matters is the work that is done so he played a very leading role in.
The development of science policy in India now like I said this was a time when India had just got independence and we were such a poor country that 80% of our population was living in balty we were struggling for food and energy and the entire world looked down on us as a.
Hopeless nation and one of the biggest challenges we had was the energy problem and we practically needed a miracle to recover from the destruction of British Raj and this miracle is what homi Baba saw he knew that even though nuclear bombs were dangerous the process behind nuclear bombs was the miracle that India desperately needed because homi Baba.
Knew the power of nuclear energy look at this this 1in tall uranium pallet can release so much energy that it is equivalent to 1 ton of coal 564 L of oil and about 17,000 cubic feet of natural gas and homi Baba knew that nuclear energy could make India independent from the import of coal and oil he knew that it would position India as a global.
Leader in science and technology and most importantly homi Baba knew that if India had to become a developed Nation India needed nuclear energy and today in the 21st century nuclear power is even more important because it is by far the cleanest source of energy you don’t believe me look at this table while coal produces 970 tons of greenhouse gas.
Emissions per gwatt hour of electricity oil produces 720 tons solar produces 53 tons wind produces 11 tons whereas nuclear only produces 6 tons of greenhouse gas emissions per gwatt hour of electricity so to homi Baba nuclear power wasn’t just an option it was an absolute necessity but in spite of the vision and ambition of homi Baba fast.
Forward to today we are so far behind in nuclear energy that as of 2020 while France produced 70% of its energy needs from nuclear Russia produced 20.6% Pakistan produced 7.1% whereas India only produced 3.3% of its energy from nuclear it hurts right but the question is why are we so far behind in nuclear energy when zero emissions is such a big.
Deal why are we still so behind in nuclear development well that is because ladies and Gentlemen Just When homi Baba was about to achieve a break through in India’s nuclear Mission homi Baba died due to mysterious circumstances and just 13 days before homi Baba our prime minister L bahadur shastri had died in mysterious circumstances and that to in.
The Soviet Union when he had gone to talk peace with Pakistan L bahad shastri LA State Mr shastri died in TSH Kent Soviet Central Asia the man who led India to victory in the 1965 war against Pakistan jir B father of India’s atomic energy program and untimely death he dreamt of creating a nuclear bomb for India and you know what guys both these.
Leaders were about to achieve a breakthrough in India’s nuclear program and both died in mysterious circumstances within just a 2 week span while there was no postmortem done for shastri G homi Baba’s plane crash was left with incomplete investigation so the question is what exactly was Baba’s nuclear secret that could have changed.
India’s history forever why has India fallen so far behind today what are the challenges that are paralyzing our growth in nuclear energy today and most importantly where does India’s nuclear energy Program stand today this video is brought to you by Odum people if you are running a.
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Sensitive state that we needed energy Independence in order to run our country smoothly so we either had to generate energy or we had to buy it from other countries but when it came to buying energy it was a very very risky move back then because the world war had just ended and the entire world saw how energy could be weaponized so if we.
Bought oil from Saudi Arabia the world was so sensitive that India was always scared that one day or the other Saudi Arabia might just cut off oil supply and choke India’s economy in fact in the 1940s the entire Middle East was controlled by the British and American oil companies so the leaders of India were very scared to be dependent on.
Western Powers again and to make matters worse we immediately got into a war with Pakistan in 1948 itself this is where two legends of India came together homi jangir Baba and jahangir ratanji Tata or jrd Tata both these gentlemen saw the need for advanced scientific research institutes in India so with JD tata’s help homi Baba set up the Tata Institute.
Of fundamental research or TIR he made a proposal to the sorabi Tata trust envisioning a new Institute a place where talented scientists would have the scope to realize their potential G’s reply was encouraging if you and or some of your colleagues in the scientific world will put up a concrete proposals back by a sound case I think that there.
Is a very good chance that the sorab Tata trust will respond and they realized that nuclear is the best energy to pursue because it’s clean it’s super efficient and the best part is unlike wind and solar you don’t have to wait for the perfect weather to operate a nuclear plant but while homi Baba was struggling with approvals and government.
Permissions there was a looming threat of Another World War because all the powerful nations in the world were conducting nuclear test one after the other the US did it in 1945 Soviet Union did it in 1949 UK did it in 1952 France did it in 1960 and by 1964 even China had a nuclear bomb the first test of the atomic bomb in the New Mexico desert.
Stting headlines PL the American Press following news of the atom explosion within the borders of the Soviet Union 1952 Britain began an era of nuclear testing to Dr Penny and his team great credit is due for this Mighty British achievement deep in the Sahara France goes forward with the detonation of her first atomic bomb at 300 p.m. on October.
The 16th 1964 China exploded its first atomic bomb the shatter in over to a new era in man’s history so India desperately needed a nuclear strategy but the question is where does this nuclear energy come from well it comes from a very important element called uranium and here’s where you need to understand.
A little bit of science as to how is nuclear energy produced you see this is your uranium atom which is made up of protons and neutrons there are 92 protons and 143 neutrons in a uranium atom and in a nuclear energy reactor what happens is that a tiny Neutron is thrown at a uranium atom and this uranium 235 atom.
It absorbs a neutron and this makes the nucleus extremely unstable and it splits into two smaller nuclei this splitting releases a huge amount of energy and we use this energy to heat water which is turned into steam which then spins a turbine and when the turbine spins we get electricity almost all countries use this process which is done in something.
Called a light Water Reactor but you know what even with uranium there was one big problem homi Baba understood that even for Uranium reactors we had to import uranium from other countries because India only had world’s 1 to 2% of uranium and we needed to use something that was readily available in India itself so you know what homi Baba.
Realized that a precious fuel source was lying in our beaches in our Sands and this magic material is called called thorium for those who don’t know thorium is again another element which is silvery slightly radioactive and which is even more cleaner and more energy efficient than uranium and the best part is that India has one of the world’s.
Largest reserves of Thorium in fact we have 25% of the entire world’s thorium look at this chart millions of tons of monite sand is even today found in the coastal regions of odisha Andra Tamil Nadu Kera and jarand so homi Baba knew that thorium was a life-changing resource for India but the problem was that no other country had used thorium.
Before so there was no blueprint on how to use thorium to produce nuclear energy so here’s where homi Baba came up with a unique three-step nuclear program as a way to develop nuclear energy by using this thorium now again this is a little technical but then stay with me in this three-step process stage number one was to use uranium in reactors to produce.
Electricity and generate plutonium as a byproduct in stage two this plutonium is used to generate a lot of electricity and produce more plutonium from uranium secondly they start producing uranium 233 from thorium itself and then in stage three thorium is used along with uranium 233 produced in stage two to produce even more energy and for all.
These three stages we needed different types of reactors and more importantly back then all these stages required extensive research and development and if completed it would have turned India into an energy superpower and homi Baba achieved such quick success that in 1956 India got its first light Water Reactor called upsera and we built two more by.
1961 but this is when the India China war broke out in 1962 and then the Indo Pakistan War started in 1965 on October the 20th 1962 the first Chinese shells came screaming down and the war had begun the ch Army launched a massive attack on India both in the dark and in the Northeast it was this opportunism that led to the India Pakistan war of.
1965 July April the armies of India and Pakistan were involved in a full battle so obviously there was shortage of resources and the research got slowed down but you know what during the indo-china war homi Baba understood that unless India has a nuclear bomb these nations will keep on attacking us in fact on 4th of October 1964 which was.
Just 2 weeks before the first Chinese nuclear weapon test homi Baba declared that India could make an atomic bomb within just 18 months of a decision to do so so did we make the nuclear bomb well not really this was when javala Neu G passed away and L bahadur shastri G became the prime minister of India and Dr homie told shastri G that it was.
Absolutely important that we start conducting our test as soon as possible and you know what even though shastri G was hesitant he gave the green light for India’s nuclear defense program in 1965 but just when we were about to achieve a breakthrough in thorium processing and having a nuclear bomb two terrible things happened on 11th of January 1966.
When shastri G went to the Soviet Union to have peace talks with Pakistan just one day after signing the peace treaty he’s mysteriously said to have died due to a heart attack and you know why this was mysterious because number one in spite of the death of the leader of a Nation no postmortem was conducted in the USSR the postmortem conducted in.
India was inconclusive and some reports suggest that his body had turned blue and there were cut marks on his abdomen which raised serious suspicions of poisoning and just as India was trying to cope up with the death of shastri G just 13 days later on 24th of January 1966 homi Baba is to have died in a plane crash in Switzerland homi jangir.
Baba father of India’s atomic energy program homi Baba an untimely death he dreamt of creating a nuclear bomb for India and again this was also mysterious because the investigation was left incomplete this is how homi Baba and his dream of India becoming a.
Nuclear superpower and an energy independent country became a distant dream again and you know what happened after homi Baba’s death look at this in 1968 after China UK France US and Soviet Union all these powerful Nations conducted their nuclear test they made everyone sign something called the nonproliferation.
Treaty it was 23 years after the US dropped an atomic bomb on Hiroshima 6 years after the Cuban Missile Crisis five nuclear armed Nations signed a deal in 1968 that brought the world back from the brink of a potentially catastrophic War the US Russia UK France and China undertook in good faith to give up their.
Nuclear weapons the rest of the world pledged not to acquire them and this treaty essentially meant that no other country could conduct nuclear tests which means China UK US France and Soviet Union these nations could have nuclear bombs but nobody else can have it and in spite of it being such a stupid policy 191 count signed it and.
Only three countries did not sign it Israel Pakistan and India and if you study homi Baba’s life and his speeches you will realize that homi Baba feared three things he feared that big Nations will attack us without fearing us if we do not build a nuclear bomb he feared that if we don’t build our nuclear energy resources oil Nations will.
Paralyze our economy and lastly he feared that as time passes building a nuclear bomb will become more and more difficult due to International pressure sure and guess what all three things happened in 1971 when Pakistan attacked East Pakistan it entered India’s airspace because of which India waged a war against Pakistan during this time.
The United States sent its Navy to the Bay of Bengal and the US president Richard Nixon was even about to drop a nuclear bomb on India yes Nixon was about to drop a nuclear bomb on India it was only because of the Soviets that the US didn’t bomb us because they came to protect us so did the big Nations try to mess with us like Dr homie thought.
Absolutely yes then in 1973 and 1979 when the Arab Israeli War broke out what did the oil Nations do they spiked the oil price so much that oil prices quadruped by 1974 and then again doubled in 1979 which again caused an energy crisis in India caused a food crisis in India and it paralyzed the economy just like Dr homie feared and this didn’t.
Happen once or twice it happened again in 2022 during the Russia Ukraine war and it will happen again due to the Israel Iran War and even today just like we were dependent on oil back then today we are dependent on China for solar cells we are dependent on China for our EV cells and most importantly we are dependent on the Middle East for oil so.
Did our dependence on other countries paralyze our economy absolutely yes and lastly homi Baba also feared that as time passes the international pressure will only make it more and more difficult to conduct a nuclear test did it happen well look at this when our prime minister indraa Gandhi approved the.
Nuclear test by 1974 India conducted its first nuclear test called smiling Buddha this was not a weapons grade test but a peaceful nuclear explosion which is why it was called smiling Buddha but you know what happened the international societies of the West cut our access to critical nuclear technology they cut our access to uranium and the scientists.
From US and Canada stopped working with India then under wpai G in May 1998 which is 32 years after homi Baba’s death India made history by conducting a series of five nuclear tests known as pokran 2 today at 1545 hours India conducted three underground nuclear tests in the poan range 1998.
India and while we were proudly celebrating science and security what did the US do they imposed economic sanctions and tried to economy again just last week India conducted a series of nuclear explosive tests reminding us that technology is not always a Force for good India’s action threatens the stability of Asia and.
Challenges The Firm International consensus to stop all nuclear testing so did the international pressure on us keep on increasing with time just like Dr homie feared absolutely yes and even today after 58 years of homi Baba’s death we are yet to solve the second problem for India which is energy dependence we are still dependent on the.
Middle East and we still don’t use nuclear energy for our energy production as much as we should so this makes the question what the hell are we doing about the thorium reserves and why are we not using it well if you remember Dr homi Baba had a three-step process and you know what we are still left to complete the three-step process and out.
Of these three steps for the first step India has 24 operable reactors for stage two our first fast breeding reactor was just completed this year but for the third stage we still do not have a thorium reactor at all and you know which country has it it is none other than China and China is the only country that has this Tech and it is yet to test.
It this is the reason why we are so far behind in our nuclear energy that only 3% of our energy comes from nuclear so what are we doing to fix it I I don’t know but there are three lessons that we need to learn from the iconic story of homi Baba lesson number one if any country is on the verge of a breakthrough the West will paralyze them.
One way or the other lesson number two International politics is designed to favor the powerful and not the rising Powers so India needs to be very careful when it makes friends with other countries because in geopolitics there are no friends only benefits and Rivals and lastly India needs to equip itself with nuclear just like homie sir.
Envisioned and we need to push our government to make sure that we bring his vision to life because as once a great man said a nation is not merely defined by the lines on a map but by the Vigor of its energy the robustness of its economy and the strength of its defense this was the iconic story of homi Baba and his vision for India and I.
Just hope you learn something valuable from this case study that’s all from my side for today guys if you learn something valuable please make sure to hit the like button in order to make beuty Baba happy and for more such insightful business and political case studies please subscribe to our Channel thank you so much for watching I will.
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