Chief of Naval Staff Admiral Suresh Mehta on Saturday brushed aside all apprehensions of the Left parties and a section of the intellectuals about radiation hazards  from  one of  the world's largest nuclear-powered aircraft carriers, the USS Nimitz, during its three-day scheduled docking at the Chennai port.
“You have Kalpakkam right next to you. If there is something  which may happen in the USS Nimitz, can it not happen in Kalpakkam ?” Admiral Mehta asked while addressing a news conference.
The Chief of Naval Staff who was here in the city to visit Garden Reach Shipbuilders & Engineers (GRSE) that manufactures various types of fast attack ships for the Indian Navy, was categorical in his assertion that the anchorage of the US nuclear ship at Chennai had been cleared as  a radiation safety contingency plan was already in place and  due approval from the standing environmental safety committee had also been received.
The UPA government has  been at the receiving end following sharp attacks from the CPI(M) and other Left coalition partners for its nod for the berthing of  the USS Nimitz at the Chennai port. The CPI(M) has already sought an explanation from the government for the latter's decision.
“This is not the first time a ship is visiting us. There are certain important things we are required to do. As a naval power, we visit people, people visit us. If people visit us and if we don't have any ideological objection, rest of things are taken care of,”  he said in an indirect dig at the Left.
“There is a set procedure laid down which has been followed in this case as much as it was followed in all other cases. We have nothing to worry about,” Admiral Mehta affirmed.
N-powered ship
In fact, USS Nimitz, according to defence sources, is the 11th N-powered ship to dock in the Indian waters since 2001,with identical warships from France and the UK having visited without raising any storm. Two US nuclear cruisers,USS Alexandria and USS Santa Fe, visited Goa in October 2004 and October 2005 respectively.
Admiral Mehta says that the Centre is dutybound to ensure that safety of the people on board the ship. Besides,  the US Navy has categorically stated  that it has already operated the  ship several hours safely and without any threat of radiation hazards.
When queried whether delays in the decision-making process in the government had been hindering fast modernization of the Navy, Admiral Mehta conceded that procedural hazards consumed a lot of time. The Navy had recently been permitted to raise a Request for Proposal(RFP) to ask manufacturers if they would sell  aircraft. “This process has already taken five years; it'll take another five to six years more before the first aircraft comes to India. This is the gestation period of these kind of projects,” he observed.
“Buildng a modern, state-of-the-art ship will take anything between 7 and 10 years and it takes 50 years to build a navy,” he added.
After nearly six years, the Indian government signalled its approval on Friday for floating the biggest ever global tender for the purchase of 126 medium multi-role combat aircraft worth Rs 42,000 crore.
“It (delay) ensures there's no wrong-doing at any stage,” he said.
To a question, Admiral Mehta admitted that re-fitting exercise of INS Vikramaditya would take some more time while the delivery of modern Russian  missile destroyer Groshkov would be inordinately delayed. There has been no official word from the Russian side though.
He stated“we have already taken it up with them,urging that the ship comes back to us on time. I believe there'll be some delay. We expected it to join the Indian Navy in 2008. But that'll not happen. We now hope it'd join the fleet end of 2009”.
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Officials mum on nuke on board
On board US aircraft carrier, USS NIMITZ, pti: As the US nuclear-powered warship arrives near Chennai surrounded by controversy, top officials of USS Nimitz CVN 68 refused to either “confirm or deny the presence of nuclear weapons on board.
“We can neither confirm nor deny the presence of weapons on board the ship. The general US policy is that we do not routinely deploy nuclear weapons on any of our ships, attack submarines or aircraft,” Rear Admiral John Terence Blake, Commander, Carrier Strike Group 11 of USS Nimitz, told a handful of presspersons on board one of the biggest aircraft carriers in the world.
USS Nimitz is to dock within two miles from the port of Chennai, according to another top official.
“We do not deploy (nuclear weapons) ‘routinely’. We do not go into specifics,” he said when queried further on the topic.
The ship is currently stationed at 470 miles from Chennai and 100 miles from the coast of Sri Lanka.
Captain Michael C Manazir, Commanding Officer, USS Nimitz also toed the same line saying, “we can’t confirm the presence or absence of nuclear weapons on board”.
These statements come amidst wide spread protests from political parties and environmental agencies against the docking of the ship at the Chennai port between July 1 and 5 and the Defence Ministry clearing its arrival at Chennai.
CPI to protests
The CPI is planning to protest against the berthing of the ship at the port on Tuesday in Chennai.
Both the Defence Ministry and the US Embassy had issued statements saying that there were no nuclear weapons on board the Nimitz.
“USS Nimitz is a nuclear-powered aircraft carrier and is not known to be carrying weapons with nuclear warheads. It is not going to enter the on-shore or alongside berths in Chennai port  but will be anchored in water some distance away from the land,” the Defence Ministry statement said.
However, Captain Manazir told reporters that “the Nimitz will be berthed a couple of miles from the port and permission has been given anchor right of the port. In fact, you will be able to see the ship from the beach.”
The Nimitz was involved in “Operation Iraqi Freedom” and was supporting the coalition troops fighting in Iraq.
Captain Manazir informed that the Airwing Commander of INS Viraat and 15 other officials of the Indian Navy had visited the ship on Thursday.
“It was a nice visit. We showed them our ship and answered their questions...its about transparency,” he said.
Both the officials called the port call as a chance to further strengthen ties between the two navies and “fostering relationship with India”.
The crew members of the Nimitz will be involved in community work in Chennai, including cleaning up the Marina Beach, visiting old age homes and painting murals at a school.