While driving down to Jaisalmer we stopped at the city of Pokhran to check out its famous fort.
Sadly this ancient caravan town is
today only known to most Indians as the testing grounds of the country's
controversial nuclear arms programme.
The locals here talk about how the Indian
army covered the craters in the ground formed due to the tests with mountains
of onions as they absorb nuclear radiation which they feared could have escaped
in to the atmosphere! There is however no mention of this in any media reports
and the Indian government maintains that there was no leak of any nuclear
radiation. Hopefully the government is right although it's difficult to believe
that they would actually have admitted to any such disaster especially given
the international pressure that India was under just after the tests.
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