P.K. Iyengar, one of the key architects behind Pokhran-I and a former chairman of the Atomic Energy Commission, passed away in Mumbai on Wednesday at 80 following a brief illness. He is survived by his wife, a son and a daughter. Both children are scientists.
“He breathed his last at 3.30 pm at Barc Hospital due to complications from lung infection,” his son Srinivas Iyengar said.
A noted nuclear physicist and scientist, Iyengar was a recipient of the Padma Bhushan and the Shanti Swarup Bhatnagar Award. A former secretary of the Department of Atomic Energy (1990-93), Iyengar had a keen interest in developing indigenous experimental facilities like neutron diffractometers and neutron scattering spectrometers.
Iyengar was also one of the key figures in Operation Smiling Buddha — the first peaceful nuclear explosion at Pokhran on May 18, 1974 — as second-in-command, after Raja Ramanna.
Interestingly, he was very critical of the Indo-US nuclear deal, on the ground that it was tilted in favour of the US. “Dr Iyengar was a bitter witness to international sanctions on India post-1974 explosions and was never able to overcome it even when the international environment changed after 2005. While the DAE welcomed the lifting of the sanctions in 2008 by the nuclear supplier’s group, Iyengar stuck to a more hawkish position and became a bitter opponent of the Indo-US nuclear deal,” said Shivanand Kanavi, senior journalist and author who has written extensively on the Indian nuclear programme.