Research on thorium is at quite an advanced stage. In fact as I remember they have already have tasted success. After all the speed with which you can develop uranium based plants will entirely depend upon how fast you can fund those programs. If you spend a fraction of that amount on thorium based plants then you will not need to be dependent upon US or even Russia. I think the answer to India's power problems is Thorium. We have huge reserves of thorium which can last 1000s of years. Besides uranium based programs are always more expensive.
