SHANTI Act & the Nuclear Opening

For six decades India's atomic programme ran under the Atomic Energy Act of 1962, a Cold War-era law that kept nuclear power a state monopoly. That ended in December 2025 with the SHANTI Act - short for Sustainable Harnessing and Advancement of Nuclear Energy, the closing letters standing for Transforming India - which received presidential assent on 21 December and repealed both the 1962 statute and the 2010 civil-liability law. For the first time since Independence, private companies may build and run nuclear plants under licence, supplier liability is dropped in favour of a graded, capacity-linked operator regime, and the safety regulator is written into statute. The overhaul is the legal engine for India's goal of 100 GW of nuclear capacity by 2047, up from about 8.78 GW today.