On 26 April 1948, Bhabha wrote to Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru that "the development of atomic energy should be entrusted to a very small and high-powered body composed of say three people with executive power, and answerable directly to the Prime Minister without any intervening link. For brevity, this body may be referred to as the Atomic Energy Commission." Pursuant to the Atomic Energy Act, the Atomic Energy Commission (AEC) was established on 10 August 1948. Nehru appointed Bhabha as the Commission's first chairman. The three-member Commission included S. S. Bhatnagar and K. S. Krishnan. Bhabha, Bhatnagar and Krishnan were also named to the Scientific Advisory Committee to the Ministry of Defence created in July 1948. The details of the workings of the AEC were declared state secrets for two reasons according to Nehru: "the advantage of our research would go to others before we even reaped it, and secondly it would become impossible for us to cooperate with any country which is prepared to cooperate with us in this matter, because it will not be prepared for the results of researches to become public."