The scholar George Perkovich argues that due to this secrecy and the AEC's relative freedom from government control, the "Nehru-Bhabha relationship constituted the only potentially real mechanism to check and balance the nuclear programme". Yet, rather than being "watchful and balancing", the relationship was "friendly and symbiotic". Twenty years younger than Nehru, Bhabha addressed him as "Dear Bhai", or "Dear Brother", while Nehru addressed Bhabha as "My dear Homi". Indira Gandhi later recalled that her father always found the time to speak to Bhabha, both because, she claimed, Bhabha brought to him urgent matters that required immediate attention, and because conversations with him afforded Nehru "warm moments of sensitivity that other people take for granted in their everyday life", but which are harder to come by in the life of a politician.