I don’t know, because I don’t have a subscription to The Economist. Their online edition does however post the first paragraph of what must be a good read about the recent accusation that Indian scientists were passing nuke information on to Iran. The Economist usually gives more behind the scenes coverage than most of the press.

MIGHT Iran secretly have succeeded in winning the co-operation of both of those arch nuclear rivals, India and Pakistan? The father of Pakistan’s bomb, Abdul Qadeer Khan, admitted earlier this year that he sold uranium enrichment secrets to Iran, Libya (which says it got a bomb design thrown in) and North Korea. Now the United States has fingered two senior Indian scientists…

What kind of help did India provide, and how significant is its impact? The Asia Times does give us some insight into the story:

The State Department did not detail the specific offenses by the two scientists, but officials said it involved alleged assistance to Iran’s nuclear program during the first half of 2003. Analyst Henry Sokolski, executive director of the Washington-based Non-Proliferation Policy Education Center, was quoted by news agencies as having speculated that the sanctions may relate to India’s breakthrough development of an economic way to produce tritium, a radioactive isotope used in nuclear bombs. The US and other Western countries accuse Iran of using a civilian nuclear energy program as a cover to develop atomic weapons, a charge Tehran vehemently denies.

The Indian government say this has all been blown out of proportion:

To clarify matters on its part, Indian Foreign Ministry spokesman Navtej Sarna told reporters that the two Indian scientists had sold neither materials, equipment nor technology. “No transfer of sensitive technology has taken place,” he said. “Our track record in this is well known. The US government has been asked to review the issue and withdraw the sanctions.”

Last week, US State Department spokesman Richard Boucher told a press briefing in Washington that two Indian scientists were among “14 entities” against which the US has imposed sanctions. He did not specify which entities were individuals or firms. But he said there were seven from China, two from India and one each in Belarus, North Korea, Russia, Spain and Ukraine. “The penalties apply to the entities themselves and not to countries or governments,” Boucher said. The penalties prohibit those named under the sanctions from visiting the US or doing business with any US-based companies.

Explaining the innocence of the Indian scientists, Sarna said one of them has never been to Iran and the other one had not visited the country since mid-2003. “It has been conveyed that we don’t share the US views,” he added.

Whatever the outcome, for the time being India has been put back at level with Pakistan, a position that they are always trying to get out of.

New Delhi is hoping that the present controversy will soon blow away and the countries will be able to get down to business as usual in the shortest possible time. But there is also apprehension that the inexplicable and totally unfounded accusation may be a precursor to reimposition or further tightening of the sanctions regime promulgated after the nuclear tests of 1998. These sanctions had been removed primarily because they had to be removed in the case of Pakistan, which became a close US ally after September 11 and the US could not be seen to be treating the two newly-proclaimed nuclear weapon states differently. In any case, the US has persisted with treating India and Pakistan at par with each other, a hyphen that India has long resented, but to no avail.