India will have to seriously look at nuclear energy to satisfy India's growing power needs, Dr R Chidambaram, principal scientific advisor to the government and Dept of Atomic Energy, has said.

Over the next twenty years, India would heavily rely on coal but as coal reserves were finite and renewables would give small packets of energy, India would have to finally turn to nuclear energy, he said.

Chidambaram was delivering the second Darbari Seth Memorial lecture organized by TERI in New Delhi.

He said that acceptance of nuclear energy in India was high as people desperately wanted more energy. While in countries like the United States, nuclear energy was like icing on the cake, for India was a question of bread and butter.

"The per capita electricity consumption and female literacy were the real measures of development," he said.

Chidambaram said that nine reactors were under construction and therefore the target of 20,000 megawatts now seemed achievable.

"India had the largest reserves of thorium in the world and so it would go into a three state nuclear programme. It would weave in a credible minimum nuclear deterrent. It would ensure spin offs in agriculture, medicine and industry. It would also use nuclear technology as a catalyst for growth of other technologies," he said.

India's nuclear weapons programme will be based on self-reliance, he said.

In the years ahead, he said, the critical technology areas for India would be nuclear, space, defence, information security, knowledge based technology and rural development technology.

Chidambaram warned that technology transfer from abroad is going to be more and more difficult in the years to come.

As it is foreign companies were openly saying that they would rather set up units in India rather than transfer technology and some of them who have done so have even tried taking over joint ventures. Indian industry has to fall back on Indian research and development, he said.

"There are some science and technology areas like atomic energy, space and information technology software where the world does not view India as a developing country anymore. But to become a developed country India had to be scientifically advanced and militarily strong," he said.

Defence Minister George Fernandes in his presidential address said that the Himalayas were crumbling and it seriously needed attention.

He said that a Trans-Himalayan authority would be set up in four months to save the Himalayas. Defence personnel  were specially given video cameras to record the pace at which the Himalayas were crumbling. The armed forces and the Eco Task Force of the army who have done some phenomenal work in afforestation and conservation of soil and water were best suited to arrest the disintegration of the Himalayas, he said.

He said that an annual event like the Darbari Seth Memorial Lecture brought back memories of Darbari Seth who was a great business visionary who stood tall in corporate India with his risk taking abilities.

Darbari Seth was the chairman of Tata Chemicals and the founder chairman of TERI.