India Russia sign nuclear contracts | Fusion - WeRIndia

India and Russia have chosen to join forces in the design of India’s largest nuclear power plant. During Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s visit to Russia two months ago, the two countries signed an agreement for the design works and main equipment supply for Unit 5 and Unit 6 of the Kudankulam Nuclear Power Plant in Tamil Nadu.

Three additional contracts were signed yesterday by the Nuclear Power Corporation of India (or NPCIL) and the JSC (Joint-Stock Company) Atomstroyexport from Russia.

These contracts are for the priority design works, working design, and main equipment supply for the Stage III of the Kudankulam Nuclear Power Plant.

Andrey Lebedev, the Vice President on the Southern Asian projects of the JSC ASE EC (JSC Atomstroyexport Engineering Company), has said that the designing and development of the procurement procedures for Russian production will begin soon.

The process of this agreement has taken several months, since the initial agreement was made over on June 1st of this year, during the talks between Narendra Modi and Vladimir Putin, the Russian President.

On July 13th, the approval for the three additional contracts was received from the Russian Rosatom State Corporation, the Russian Federation Ministry of Economic Development, and the Indian Ministry of Finance.

Six days later, on July 19th, the Board of Directors of the NPCIL also approved the signing of these three additional contracts for the 5th and 6th units of the Kudankulam Nuclear Power Plant. However, it was only yesterday that the contracts were finally signed, fully sealing the agreement between India and Russia.

Since this Nuclear Power Plant, the largest in India, was built under another agreement between India and Russia back in 1988, both countries hope that these contracts will help further strengthen both their militaries and their bond with each other.

Image credit: BRICS leaders meet at G20 Summit, 15 Nov 2015 image by GovernmentZA is licensed under CC BY-ND 2.0

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