ABSTRACT
Any discussion on India’s nuclear policy has to begin with the question of whether India should manufacture nuclear weapons. The question was pertinent even before China detonated its first nuclear device on 16 October 1964. There are countries that are too small, weak, and technologically poor even to think of manufacturing nuclear weapons. India obviously is not one of them. These weapons automatically confer certain advantages—political, economic, and military—which India cannot be blind to. Of course, the issue of acquiring nuclear weapons gained greater urgency for India after the Chinese explosion of October 1964.
