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ShareNew Delhi: The government is learnt to be deliberating on opening up the atomic energy sector to private players, though no decision has been taken yet.
"The government has not taken a final view on the matter," commerce and industry minister Anand Sharma said in reply to a query from DNA Money on Wednesday.
Atomic energy is among the industries reserved for the public sector at present.
The Prime Minister's Economic Advisory Council headed by C Rangarajan had recently recommended that Indo-US nuclear agreement must be leveraged to meet the power requirement of the country. Sharma said the EAC report would be discussed (by ministries and departments).
A source in the power ministry, who did not want to be identified, said "as the current policy of the government goes, the private players would not be allowed to have management control in the nuclear power projects."
"This will leave very little scope for the private players to earn the kind of return they expect from their investments. That is why I do not think there is going to be any big investment in the nuclear power sector from the private sector," the source added.
Expressing concern over shortage of electricity power, the Economic Advisory Council, in its Economic Outlook for 2009-10, said the government intervention in capacity creation and other supportive components of the electricity business is crucial. The interventions could include encouraging more private sector investment in the power sector, having an active plan for creating power capacity over the next 15 years, developing natural gas and nuclear energy based power plants and leveraging the India-US nuclear agreement to rapidly enhance the scope of nuclear power generating capacity, according to the Council.
The Council added that the Atomic Energy Act could be amended to permit the entry of reputed private companies in the business.
