Dubai: Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, while making his first suo moto statement detailing the Indo-US nuclear deal tomorrow will not only emphasise the agreement as a "win-win" for both countries, but also announce that one of India's first reactors Cirus will be scrapped.

Top level government sources said Singh is expected to stress the deal ends Delhi's nuclear isolation and gives it de facto nuclear weapons status. But more significantly, he must announce the only concession that has been made during negotiations over the shutdown of the 40 MW reactor at the Bhabha Atomic Research Centre (BARC), Mumbai.

India has promised to phase out Cirus over the next five years, with scientific advisers Anil Kakodkar, chairman of the Department of Atomic Energy Agency, and former chairman R. Chidambaram satisfied the ageing reactor was of little further use. Singh will stress he has the full backing of the Indian scientific community who advised his negotiating team led by India's National Security Adviser M.K. Narayanan and Foreign Secretary Shyam Saran.

Sources said the key part of the deal uninterrupted fuel supply is to be built into the India-US Nuclear agreement after the US Congress passes legislation that allows India access to nuclear technology.

Similar agreements follow with the Nuclear Suppliers Group and the International Atomic Energy Agency.

While the focus after US President Bush's visit has been on the difficulties that a Republican President will face in changing US law in Congress to make a one time waiver for India, opposition to the deal at home has muted as the impression gathered strength that India had the better of the bargain.

The opposition BJP, despite not having the details until Singh makes his statement to parliament, yesterday called it "a sell-out to the US." The Left parties said they will adhere to parliamentary propriety and wait for the prime minister's official statement.

But as it emerges that India will shut down the Cirus reactor in a bid to win Congressional approval and silence the non-proliferation lobby which has used Cirus to question India's commitment to non-proliferation, the opposition as well as one strand of the scientific community are set to make Cirus an issue.

Given India's no first use policy and its need for a significant second strike capability, there are concerns that scrapping Cirus will eat into the production of weapons-grade plutonium. Production will now be limited to the 100MW Dhruva reactor, outside the safeguards regime. Scientists at BARC said that until another nuclear reactor is built to replace Cirus, using its indigenously built components, the Canadian-US reactor should not be scrapped.

It was from this 40MW reactor, built in 1954 with Canadian help, which became operational in 1960 with heavy water obtained from the US, that weapons grade plutonium was manufactured and diverted to fuel India's first nuclear tests in 1974.

Peaceful tests

At that time, former prime minister Indira Gandhi described the tests as "peaceful".

Both Canada and the US ended nuclear co-operation, and cancelled uranium supplies to Cirus, affecting Tarapur I and Tarapur II, as it violated a 1956 US-India contract which said that US heavy water could only be used for peaceful purposes.

Given India's no first use policy and its need for a significant second strike capability, there are concerns that scrapping Cirus will eat into the production of weapons-grade plutonium. Production will now be limited to the 100MW Dhruva reactor, outside the safeguards regime.