Secretary Rubio and India’s External Affairs Minister Jaishankar discuss nuclear cooperation, trade, and regional ties

The “Sustainable Harnessing and Advancement of Nuclear Energy for Transforming India (SHANTI) Bill, 2025” is India’s new framework law for civilian nuclear energy. It replaces and consolidates older laws (the Atomic Energy Act 1962 and the Civil Liability for Nuclear Damage Act 2010) to modernise regulation and support a big expansion of nuclear power. Key changes include:

• Puts the Atomic Energy Regulatory Board on a clear statutory basis, strengthening its legal powers and safety oversight.
• Creates a single, updated framework for licensing, safety authorisation, and regulation of nuclear facilities and radioactive materials.
• Allows controlled private and joint‑venture participation in the civil nuclear power sector, while keeping sensitive materials and spent fuel under government control.
• Overhauls liability rules: keeps compensation for victims of nuclear incidents but rationalises operator liability (graded caps, a Nuclear Liability Fund, and reliance on international compensation) and removes automatic supplier liability, bringing India closer to global practice.
• Aims to support the government’s target of about 100 GW of nuclear power capacity by 2047 and explicitly covers environmental and economic damage from nuclear harm.

These changes are intended to make it easier to finance and build more reactors while tightening formal safety and regulatory arrangements.

“U.S.–India civil nuclear cooperation” means government‑approved cooperation on peaceful (non‑weapons) nuclear energy between the two countries—things like U.S. companies supplying nuclear fuel, technology, equipment, and potentially building reactors in India under international safeguards. In practice it rests on:

• The 2005–2008 U.S.–India Civil Nuclear Cooperation Initiative and the bilateral “123 Agreement” for peaceful nuclear cooperation, which sets the legal terms for trade in nuclear material, equipment and technology.
• India’s safeguards agreement with the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), which places its designated civilian facilities under international inspection.
• A Nuclear Suppliers Group (NSG) waiver that allows countries to export nuclear items to India despite it not being in the Non‑Proliferation Treaty. For new projects, U.S. reactor vendors (e.g., Westinghouse, GE‑Hitachi) still need: U.S. export licenses, Indian regulatory approvals (including from the strengthened regulator under the SHANTI framework), site and environmental clearances in India, and project‑specific commercial contracts that meet both countries’ laws and safety/liability rules.

For U.S.–India supply chains, the “critical minerals” most often discussed include:

• Battery and clean‑energy materials: lithium, cobalt, nickel, graphite and manganese – vital for electric‑vehicle and grid batteries, and many renewable‑energy systems.
• Rare earth elements (REEs) such as neodymium, dysprosium, terbium – used in high‑strength magnets for wind turbines, EV motors, guidance systems and many electronics.
• Other high‑tech and defence minerals: gallium, titanium, vanadium, hafnium, tungsten and similar metals – important for semiconductors, aircraft and jet engines, advanced sensors, satellites and military systems. They matter because demand for clean energy and advanced technologies is growing fast, and China currently dominates much of the mining and especially the refining/processing of these minerals. U.S.–India cooperation aims to diversify supply, build processing and recycling capacity, and reduce vulnerability to supply disruptions or political leverage.

The United States and India are negotiating a new bilateral trade agreement, often described as a phased or “first tranche” deal, to deepen market access and address tariffs and non‑tariff barriers. Current stage (late 2025 / early 2026, when the readout is dated):

• By late 2025 India and the U.S. had held multiple rounds of talks and publicly said they hoped to conclude the first phase of a “mutually beneficial, multi‑sector Bilateral Trade Agreement” by around the end of 2025, but tariff moves from Washington and other political issues slowed that timeline.
• Indian officials said negotiations were ongoing and that they aimed to close the first tranche “sooner than later,” but as of early January 2026 no agreement had been finalized or signed; recent reports describe talks as stalled or lacking concrete announcements. So, the negotiations are active but incomplete: both sides have not yet agreed on the first package of trade concessions, and there is no ratified bilateral trade pact in force beyond existing WTO and sector‑specific arrangements.

When the U.S. talks about a “free and open Indo‑Pacific,” it is referring to a set of political and security principles it wants to see in the region, including:

• “Free”: countries can choose their own partners; trade and investment are not blocked by coercion; sea lanes and airspace stay open for lawful commerce and navigation.
• “Open”: rules‑based order, transparent infrastructure and investment, adherence to international law (especially the UN Convention on the Law of the Sea), and open digital and economic standards rather than closed, exclusive spheres.
• In practice this has meant: strengthening alliances and partnerships (e.g., with India, Japan, Australia and ASEAN), more joint military exercises and patrols to uphold freedom of navigation, efforts to diversify supply chains, and funding or backing infrastructure and connectivity projects presented as alternatives to more opaque, debt‑heavy initiatives. The stated goal is an Indo‑Pacific that is “free, open, connected, prosperous, secure, and resilient,” rather than dominated or closed off by any single power.

Secretary Rubio is Marco Antonio Rubio, the 72nd United States Secretary of State. A Republican politician and former U.S. senator from Florida (2011–2025), he was nominated by President Trump and confirmed as Secretary of State in 2025. External Affairs Minister Subrahmanyam Jaishankar (often written S. Jaishankar) is India’s Minister of External Affairs. A former career diplomat and foreign secretary, he has served as External Affairs Minister since May 30, 2019 and is a member of India’s upper house of parliament (Rajya Sabha).

Expanded U.S.–India civil nuclear cooperation, enabled by the SHANTI Bill, could create several kinds of opportunities for American companies:

• Reactor projects and equipment: U.S. vendors like Westinghouse or GE‑Hitachi could build or supply reactors and major components for new nuclear power plants in India at sites already earmarked for U.S. technology.
• Fuel, services, and maintenance: long‑term contracts to supply nuclear fuel, spare parts, safety and monitoring systems, and specialised maintenance and life‑extension services for India’s civilian reactors.
• Engineering, construction and project management: U.S. firms could win roles in design, civil works, digital control systems, and project management as India accelerates its nuclear build‑out toward its 100‑GW target. Because the new Indian law clarifies regulation, strengthens the independent regulator and revises liability rules toward international norms, it is intended to reduce legal and financial uncertainty that previously deterred U.S. suppliers, making large commercial deals more feasible.