NEW DELHI: As Prime Minister Manmohan Singh gave the victory sign on Tuesday after his government sailed through the trust vote, leading Indian scientists sighed with relief expecting a smooth ride for the much-debated nuclear deal.

Former chairman of Atomic Energy Commission, M R Srinivasan, said the winning of the trust vote was a very important step towards implementing the nuke deal and the UPA government could now move more decisively.

"The next step is approval by the 35-member board of governors of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) and the 45-member Nuclear Suppliers' Group (NSG). I hope these processes go off without any glitches," he said. The final hurdle before it's signed and dotted is approval by the US Congress.

Former chairman of the Department of Atomic Energy Homi Sethna turned a tad polemical and said, "Indians are not idiots. They are cleverer than the government. I certainly hope that the deal will allow India to have a free hand to develop its nuclear technology."

However, another former chairman of AEC, P K Iyengar, believes the winning of the trust vote is not of much significance because three more major hurdles have to be crossed still. About the parliamentary debate Iyengar said, "It had nothing to do with the nuke deal. It was mainly to test the strength of the government before it made the next moves towards fructifying the Indo-US civilian nuclear deal."

Certain other scientists, who refused to be named, were disappointed by the quality of the debate. They said more time was wasted in slanging matches and scandalous revelations than discussing the nuclear deal — a lot about which remains outside public knowledge.