BARC gets new director
Dr Ratan Kumar Sinha took over as the new director of Bhabha Atomic Research Centre (BARC) on Wednesday and made a strong case for India to take up a global leadership role in the peaceful use of nuclear energy.
Mr Sinha (59), who became the tenth director of the country’s premier strategic lab, has been closely associated with the design and development of India’s first thorium-based Advanced Heavy Water Reactor for 15 years.
Mr Sinha took over from Dr Srikumar Banerjee, who is also the Atomic Energy Commission (AEC) chairman, at a function held at Trombay.
“It is a great moment in my life and I thank my guru Dr Kakodkar,” Dr Sinha said on the occasion. Dr Anil Kakodkar, former AEC Chairman, is his mentor. Talking to the media, Dr Sinha said, “India has to be not only relevant but also effective, excellent and efficient in taking up leadership in peaceful uses of the atom in the new advantageous situation of international cooperation.”
“We have to grow further and become better than best in the world in some areas, particularly in deployment of nuclear power in other parts of the world,” he said.
The goals set by BARC founder Homi Bhabha will remain the same but milestones and priorities will keep changing as per the time, he added.
Dr Sinha said some of the BARC’s priorities included ensuring supply of fuel to country’s first Prototype fast breeder reactor (PFBR) and other non-safeguarded reactors, besides deployment of power and increase in production and supply of radio isotopes at a competitive price.
On the deployment of thorium on a commercial scale, he said, the BARC has designed and developed a technology demonstration plant of the Advanced Heavy Water Reactor (AHWR) and it would take a few decades to reach there.
Dr Banerjee handed over the charge to Dr Sinha in the presence of several eminent scientists and engineers of the Department of Atomic Energy.
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