A New Assessment
Some years ago, I had covered this subject, dwelling mainly
on the connections between Travancore, Britain, Sir CP, and the new administration
at Delhi, trying to complete the accession of all the princely states. It was
not complete and lacked study of certain angles, and so, I am revisiting the
study to add more asides to it after reading a recent Wall Street Journal (Dec
16-17, 2023) article ‘Hunt for Rare-Earth Supplies Accelerate”. Now, this
article was all about rare earth magnets, and the search for non-radioactive
sands containing the material required for production of such magnets. But it
also dealt with having to look for such ore/sand at far away places such as
Australia and Vietnam and wean the western world from China which holds a
virtual monopoly (China refines 89% of the world's neodymium and praseodymium,
the key metals for EV magnets) on such magnet production.
I have not seen Rocket Boys yet but read the interesting article
by MG Radhakrishnan in Mathrubhumi which provides details of the supposed
meetings between Delhi and Travancore and the arm-twisting of the young Travancore
Raja by Homi Bhaba. Now what was the real story?
It all started with a very interesting UK-trained geologist
working for Travancore, named Ezra Masillamani, brother of the famous CM Agur (Travancore
resident’s office manager and author of the book - Church History of
Travancore). The family, originally Parayas, converted and can trace their
ancestry to the convert Vedamanickam of Mylady, from De-Lannoy’s period.
indications of the presence of rare earths in these sands
had initially been reported by Schomberg, Tipper, Herbert, and Christie. In a
report by Messrs. E. Masillamani and I. C. Chacko, State Geologists of
Travancore, dealing with work done during the years 1907-10, reference was made
to the occurrence of monazite in Travancore. Late in 1916, or early in 1917, a
variety of thorianite was discovered by him, carrying something like 40
percent. of uranium oxide. In the same year, the same geologist discovered two
other minerals in Travancore (Mr. Masillamani worked on a crystal of thorianite
and a partial analysis of the mineral showed that it contains 32.27 p.c. of
ThO2 and 39.86 p.c. U2O8). The most important deposit was located at the
Ashtamudi Bar, where the sands are brought down by the Kallada River.
First the importance of the sands. While the initial sand
exports to Europe were for the manufacture of gas mantles, the subsequent
interest was its potential use in nuclear technology. European, German, and
Americans competed for a share in these deposits with Travancore, and after the
end of the First World War, the new crop of capitalists including Eapen,
Masillamani, and Kesava Pillai came to the fore, with applications, only to see
them rejected. In some cases, land purchase applications were rejected, and the
land was acquired by the Circar. Eventually, a few permissions were granted but
paid low royalties.
Sir CP was initially involved with Travancore as an advisor
to the Maharani and later as the Dewan of Travancore, until 1947. Though
involved in many pioneering schemes and developmental activities, he was seen
as an autocratic administrator, loyal to the royalty that employed him. As the people’s
movements geared up, Sir CP who was fiercely anticommunist, used an iron hand
to put down any kind of protest or revolt, earning him a poor reputation. We
have discussed all these and exemplified them in previous articles.
Later, as Ilmenite became popular for the manufacture of
Titanium Dioxide, Masillamani again came to the fore in 1930, with an
application for 958 acres of mining land, but the Travancore Circar looked at
it as dubious he seemed to be fronted by American interests, approving just 50
acres. As time went by, CP Mathan also entered the fray, forming Malabar
Minerals in 1936, but CP refused to register the mining lease due to their
frayed relationship (see
article on TN & Quilon bank). The situation dragged on until
independence, with British and sometimes American companies involved in the
fringes, and Travancore drew very little royalty in the export of these sands.
The overall market and strategic outlook were not clear, but the importance of
these rare earth sands remained paramount in the public sphere, with new
applications for the metals coming about rapidly, not only in the nuclear
industry but also elsewhere.
The techno-politics of Rare Earths, Sir CP
The importance of Monazite, a phosphate compound, is that it
contains radioactive Thorium. As mentioned previously, it was originally used
for gas mantle lamps (a technology patented by Germans, but with raw material (acquired
from Travancore) monopolized by the British). With the pioneering research by
Marie Curie and Carl Schmidt, its importance in radioactivity became clear and
as the nuclear age dawned in 1945, its potential use to breed nuclear fuel
became clear.
That the British would be on their way out of India was
clear in the early years of the 40s and Sir CP, an avowed monarchist started to
lay grounds for the state to remain independent of the new India. His arguments
were persuasive and the state itself was more developed than most, relatively
stable, and considerably wealthy. I have covered these at length in an earlier
essay. For some strange reason, Sir CP did not play his critical pawn, the
Thorium business, in his play, or so we thought.
This was the period when the US decided to try and control
the global nuclear scene (after it had dropped the bombs at Hiroshima and
Nagasaki in 1945), by establishing a monopoly over all aspects of atomic
research & production. But naturally,
the Thorium deposits at Travancore came up in discussions between the US and the
UK. Until then and through WW II, sales of sands were embargoed by Britain. As
the war ground to a close, Sir CP refused to lift the embargo and insisted that
those who wanted the minerals had to establish production plants in Travancore,
arguing its desire to become an industrialized state. The US was vexed at the
turn of events, for 73% of the Monazite import was from Travancore. The British
however, were not upset about this as they continued to control the overseas
communication channels.
Covert communications, however, continued between the US and
Sir CP, and they knew that the key to success was support for Sir CP’s visions
of an independent Travancore. Thus, a tenuous link started to form between Thorium
and Travancore’s independence. As late as July 1947, an official communique
between the US Department of State and the US consul in Madras read - We
must be careful to avoid giving the Dewan any opportunity to claim a special
relationship with us, unless it should actually be our intention to establish
one. At this particular time, I should imagine he would be particularly eager
to see in the Consulate’s dealings with him, some explicit or tacit approval of
his idea of Travancore independence, in advance of the time when we can take
any decision on that question.
Sir CP knew about the nuclear significance of thorium and after
the Nagasaki bombing, he wrote to the Maharaja in 1946- “If thorium can be
utilized for the manufacture of atomic bombs (there is no reason why it should
not be), Travancore will enjoy a position very high in the world.” He also made
it clear to the newly minted CSIR, that Travancore was the sole owner of all
mineral deposits and would only deal directly with interested parties. He went
on to conclude a secret deal with the UK to export 9,000 tonnes between 1947
and 1950, in return for the establishment of a new processing plant in
Travancore. The men in power at Delhi came to know the facts only after the
reporter Bamzai, published the explosive article in Bombay’s Blitz.
Even though Homi Bhabha, the Chairman of CSIR seemed
unconcerned, Nehru was incensed. Speaking to the Indian cabinet in April 1947,
Nehru is reported to have said that he “would approve the ‘use of airpower
against Travancore, if necessary, to bring them to heel. He then asked the head
of CSIR, Sir Shanti Swarup Bhatnagar, to travel to Travancore to obtain more
information about the nature of Travancore’s arrangement with the British.
Bhabha and Swarup traveled to Trivandrum in June 1947 and came back with an
acceptable agreement, while the central government thanked Sir CP for his cooperation.
Itty Abraham in his lovely article, stops here, but the
story had another angle altogether and for that, we must study the fascinating
account provided by Sandeep Bamzai, the grandson of KN Bamzai, the intrepid Blitz
journalist. Blitz did provide an expose of what was going on, behind closed doors,
then. Bamzai explains that the printed version was one thing, but what was
provided to Nehru by Blitz behind the scenes, had damaging information on Sir
CP.
Now what could Sir CP have been up to or for that matter,
how did Nehru outwit Sir CP using the Blitz investigative report? Here is where
you can see the collective genius of Nehru, Patel, and Menon, working together
before they deputed Sampath and Bhabha.
Though Sir CP found some support from Veer Savarkar, his
master plan was to establish a direct communication link with Britain and sign
the agreement with Thorium Ltd, where on the face of it, a plant would be
established for processing the sands in Travancore (retaining natural resources
within the country), but on detailed perusal; it turned out that a majority of
the 9,000 tones would be directly exported, while only a small portion would be
processed locally. This deal was unearthed by Bamzai, and its details were turned
over to Nehru.
As Sir CP traveled to Delhi and met Mountbatten to argue his
case on Travancore’s independence, Mountbatten refused to buy Sir CP’s
arguments that Nehru was unstable and Patel was ruthless and asked him to deal
with VP Menon. VP Menon, it is mentioned, reminded Sir CP that Travancore was
the strongest breeding ground for communists in India. He asked CP what CP
could do if the communists revolted against him after 15th August, and
this veiled threat discomfited Sir CP. As we know now, a personal attack on Sir
CP would take place, sooner than later.
The counter was multipronged, and the sequence of events
went thus.
- - VP Menon mentioned the communist threat to the
Dewan, per Bamzai’s account.
- - The Dewan returning from Delhi, asked the
Maharaja to write that he would agree to the conditions, but the Raja delayed
signing the letter. Mountbatten insisted on receiving a signed document.
- - At the same time, the state congress agitation strengthened,
and, in a few days, Sir CP was stabbed by KCS Mani at a public function.
- - The Maharaja confirmed he would sign, and Patel
called off the agitation.
- - Blitz then published the one-sided agreement
between Travancore and Thorium Ltd.
Now how did Sir CP establish channels with the British? He used
the Nizam of Hyderabad to channel his communications through the Nawab of
Bhopal – Hamidullah Khan, to Jinnah in Pakistan. Using his sleuths, Nehru
obtained a copy of the Nawab’s letter to Jinnah. It signaled a confederation of
these recalcitrant states either themselves or through Pakistan to establish
links with Britain. It also became clear that Churchill was a party to this
maneuver, through his secretary Gillatt. Eventually, Nehru exposed the complete
plan to the powers in the center.
So much for Sir CP and his machinations.
Oppenheimer, Nehru & India
But there is more to this as well – it turns out as
Nayantara Sahgal narrates, that Oppenheimer attempted to communicate secretly with
Nehru through Vijaya Lakshmi Pandit, who was serving at the time as India’s
envoy to Washington.
A chilling climax to her growing unease over the
prevailing political climate in America came two weeks later with s telephone
call from Robert Oppenheimer, the renowned physicist who had headed the
experiment that produced the atom bomb. On 21 February 1951, she wrote to her
brother,
Quote – Letter dated 21st Feb 1951 VLP to JN (quoted verbatim as recent news reports have ‘massaged’ parts
of it) though the veracity of its contents cannot be established as
factual.
.jpg)
Oppenheimer wants you to know that work of a most
horrible and deadly nature is being done on the atom bomb, that step by step
America is 'deliberately' moving towards a war of annihilation. The recent
promises given by Truman to Attlee regarding the atom have resulted in research
for a weapon of the same deadly quality which will be kept very secret and used
INSTEAD of the atom. This research is going on at a furious pace. Many of those
engaged in this work are going to pieces as it is against all accepted
standards of civilized decency, and the secrecy imposed on them is almost more
than some of them can bear, Oppenheimer among them. For this purpose, more and
more thorium is required and the U.S. desires to stockpile all available
thorium. Oppenheimer has reason to believe that an approach will be made very
soon to India directly, and through Britain. In fact, he believes that one
reason why the Indian request for wheat has been so readily sponsored by the
State Department is because of what they themselves require from India. The
argument used for obtaining thorium will be that it is intended for
humanitarian purposes. According to Oppenheimer NO such purpose can at present
be achieved.
Oppenheimer 'begs' the Government of India not to sell
any thorium to the U.S. voluntarily or through pressure. He thinks India holds
the key to peace at present, but if India's vast resources of thorium are
placed at the disposal of the U.S., the greatest war ever fought will be made
possible. Secret talks have been going on between the U.S. and Britain.
Oppenheimer wants you to know that in spite of the
general belief that Britain has the atom, the only bombs she has have gone from
the U.S. That is the hold the U.S., has on her and it may be used to put
pressure on India. In conclusion, Oppenheimer begs India in the name of
humanity to maintain her present foreign policy and not be swayed by any
pressure, national or international, to depart from it.
This remarkable letter marked Top Secret and never, to my
knowledge, made public before, from the American scientist who knew what the
ghastly consequences of a war worse than nuclear war would be, carries no hint
or smear of betrayal, only a desperate bid to avert catastrophe. It appeals to
a man whom Oppenheimer regards as the sole dependable advocate for peace in
circumstances where preparations for a destructive war are proceeding behind a facade
of peace.
Oppenheimer's messenger, Amiya Chakravarti was a Bengali
poet and academic who had been closely associated with Tagore and Gandhi. At
this time, he was Fellow of the Institute of Advanced Studies in Princeton.
Oppenheimer's anguish over his part in the atom bomb had
turned him to the study of Hindu philosophy and Gandhi’s doctrine of ahimsa. He
had unbounded admiration for Nehru and had written to him in his search for
comfort during his own period of soul-searching. Vijaya Lakshmi had once had
lunch with him at Princeton and found him 'as rare a human being as he was a
great scientist'.
The US deliberations
Well, remarkable right?? I should have written this before
the article on Russell, Menon, and Nehru. But it tells you the way thoughts went
in those Cold War days. Anyway, a lot of water has flown under the bridge and
all these only raise an eyebrow. This is just yet another story from the past, of no real relevance these days.
The sands of Travancore are still coveted. The KMML and
Titanium units, locations we used to wander around during our childhood days remain,
mining rare earths, be they for magnets or whatever. Scandals concerning
exports of these sands continue to sport headlines now and then. Interestingly while the treasures of the temple are dedicated to Lord Padmanabha, these precious sands don't seem to be!
As regards Oppenheimer & the Bhagavad Gita, I chanced on
a lengthy paper on - The “Gita’ of J Robert Oppenheimer by James A. Hijiya,
published by the American Philosophical Society, Jun 2000. It is a fairly complex
but thought-provoking paper and requires careful study. That will remain a work
in progress….
References
'Captains of the Sands' Metropolitan Hegemony in Mining in
Tiruvitamkur, 1900-50 - K T Ram Mohan
Radioactive Minerals and Private Sector Mining – VT
Padmanabhan
Princestan – Sandeep Bamzai
Rare Earths: The cold war in the annals of Travancore – Itty
Abraham
Travancore’s Pakistan Intrigues, 1946-47
A Life in Twilight -Mark Wolverton
Nehru: Civilizing A Savage World - Nayantara Sahgal
