The Nanda Devi expedition to install a plutonium-powered listening device atop the Nanda Devi mountain (now in Uttarakhand, then in Uttar Pradesh) in 1965 and its subsequent loss were matters of discussion in various circles last week after The Washington Post published a report claiming to have fresh details. While the matter has been reported in India several times and a detailed book has been written on it by the leader of the fateful expedition, Captain M S Kohli, it is worthwhile to revisit the events of April 1978, when The Indian Express reported about the story following its publication in a US magazine.
On April 13, 1978, the Washington correspondent of The Indian Express, T V Parasuram, sent a report which was published with the headline “CIA planted device may pollute Ganga”. The report said that a lost plutonium-powered monitoring device planted by the United States of America’s Central Intelligence Agency might endanger the headwaters of the Ganga through radioactivity and that Congressman Richard Ottinger was writing to President Jimmy Carter demanding an investigation of the CIA caper.
The report quoted Writer Howard Kohn, who had written an article in a journal, that in late 1964, after the Chinese exploded their first nuclear device, the CIA wanted a monitoring device. It further said that the satellite technology was not perfect at that time and that the CIA went out and recruited a team of “crack American mountain climbers with inducements of patriotism plus a thousand dollars a month for about eight months and a free trip”.
The Indian Express report on CIA planted nuclear powered device in 1978. (Photo: National Archives)
The news report created a massive political buzz in Indian political circles, with an uproar in Parliament forcing the then prime minister, Morarji Desai, to make a statement. The foreign secretary summoned the then US ambassador to India, demanding an explanation, while a team of scientists of the Bhabha Atomic Research Centre (BARC) was quickly formed to detect any contamination of the waters of the Ganga, and the Army as well as the Indian Air Force (IAF) was roped in to provide the necessary logistic backup.
Documents available in the national archives say that US Ambassador Robert F Goheen was called to the Foreign Office by Foreign Secretary J S Mehta. Mehta referred to the article in The Indian Express and told the ambassador that the reports about a nuclear device having been planted by CIA agents near the headwaters of the Ganga were bound to cause grave concern to the Government, Parliament and the people of India.
“The Foreign Secretary requested the US Ambassador to ascertain the truth as early as possible. Ambassador Goheen replied that he had already received a message about these reports from the State Department, which was looking into the matter and would let the Ambassador know as soon as the facts had been ascertained,” the document says.
It was decided that a team of two scientists—P Abraham and Dr K C Pillai—from BARC’s health physics division would be taken to the Nanda Devi location on the morning of April 16, 1978, for aerial reconnaissance and indicate the sampling site to Army/IAF personnel. The Army was asked to advise the team on the accessibility by road of the sites indicated by the scientists, from where they would pick up the requisite number of sampling spots and return to Delhi.
At the sampling locations, the Army/IAF was asked to help the scientists get the samples as per their instructions and arrange for their dispatch to BARC in Trombay.
Morarji Desai told Parliament that in the light of the prevailing international situation and scientfic developments that were taking place both far and near, it was decided by the Government of India and the Government of US at the highest level that a remote-sensing device with a nuclear power-pack should be installed near the highest point of Nanda Devi with the object of securing information about missile developments.
Giving technical details about the device, Desai said it comprised a power system energised by 2 to 3 pounds of plutonium-238 metal alloy, which is contained in several doubly encapsulated leak-tight capsules. The inner capsules enclosing the plutonium are made of 20 mm-thick tantalum, a refractory metal. The primary function of tantalum is to inhibit the corrosive action of the plutonium fuel. The outer capsules are of a strong nickel alloy with temperature-resistant properties. The capsules are encased in a graphite heat block, which, along with the thermo-electrical modules, is in turn encased in a cylındrical aluminium casing which is 14 inches in diameter and 13 inches high. The total weight of the entire assembly was 38 pounds.
“Searches both on the ground and by helicopters were organised every year over a wide area and continued till late 1968, but without the equipment being sighted or detected by scientific means,” Desai said.
Desai added that simultaneously, samples of water were taken up to 1970 and were under observation for some years, but no trace of contamination was detected.
“In 1967, a new device was taken to the same area and was duly installed on a neighbouring peak. This functioned normally for a while but was removed subsequently in 1968, and the equipment was returned to the United States,” he said.
Amid all the brouhaha, there was an amusing footnote to the entire affair: the Army demanded to know under which head the entire expenditure incurred to collect river water samples from Haridwar, Rishikesh, and Banbasa was to be debited.