ABSTRACT
This chapter demonstrates that the security benefits of nuclear weaponization have proven to be as illusory, dubious and fragile for India as they are for others, while the financial, developmental, political, humanitarian and even security costs, risks and dangers are only too real. It argues that a denuclearized world that includes the destruction of India's nuclear stockpile would favourably affect the balance of India's security and other interests, national and international interests, and material interests and value goals. Contrary to facile claims of strategic, military or political utility and economic cost-effectiveness, once drill down into the arguments, there is no persuasive need for India to stay nuclear armed. A self-confident India would be a norm setter and rule shaper, not merely a passive norm and rule taker, in global affairs. The interactive web of multiple nuclear weapon capable states also creates a dynamic far more complex and unpredictable than that which prevailed during the Cold War.
