The Making of the Indian Atomic Bomb — Science, Secrecy and the Postcolonial State by Itty Abraham, The Tribune 8Aug99

IN the mid-fifties Homi Bhabha took a bet with Sir John Cockcroft, the then head of Britain’s Atomic Energy Authority facility at Harwell, that India’s first nuclear reactor “Apsara” would be ready in a year’s time. Although the one-megawatt reactor finally went critical on August 4, 1956, Bhabha lost the bet because the reactor was late by a few days. But with that event the hyper-traditional met the hyper-modern in the shape of the atomic reactors, the most modern of objects so similar in shape to the lingams found in countless Shiva temples across the country.” >>>