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Confusing signals on nuclear deal : Left says, no threat to UPA Government and no mid-term poll

	November 05, 2007

Conflicting signals are coming from all major actors on the domestic scene on the India-US civilian nuclear deal. Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, while conceding that there is some delay in the deal, says, the last word has not been said on the issue. The CPI(M) says that differences with Prime Minister Manmohan Singh on the nuclear deal do not mean that the Left parties do not have respect for the Prime Minister. Party general secretary Prakash Karat has said that the country need not face a mid-term poll in the immediate future. At the same time, he said the Left parties do not want the UPA government to go to the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) for further talks on the Indo-US nuclear agreement.



The CPI national council, while asserting that there has been no dilution in the Left’s stand on the nuclear deal, has said that the party has not cast any aspersions on the Prime Minister. Party general secretary A.B. Bardhan said that he does not rule out the possibility of finding a consensus on the nu¬clear deal.



The Left parties have also made it clear that they want a discussion on the nuclear deal in Parliament under a rule which does not entail voting. This is expected to avert the prospect of a government defeat on the issue.



The main opposition, the BJP, has said that while it will not be possible for the party to accept the 123 agreement in the present form, it could support the government on the deal if its concerns were addressed.



In another significant development, official and unofficial representatives of the United States have been meeting Indian political leaders, not only of the Government, but also of the BJP and the Left to push the nuclear deal. Former US Secretary of State Henry Kissinger met both Government leaders and the top leaders of the BJP in New Delhi last week to point out how the nuclear deal would be good for India. While Kissinger met Leader of the Opposition in the Lok Sabha L.K. Advani, US Ambassador to India David Mulford met BJP president Rajnath Singh. While the BJP leaders stuck to their stand that the party’s apprehensions about the deal have not been addressed and that the deal was not acceptable in its present form, observers see a certain softening of the party stand on the nuclear deal. BJP president Rajnath Singh said that the party is ready for a Parliamentary debate and talks with the Government on the deal.





Efforts continue to build broad-based national consensus : PM



Downplaying the consequences of delay in operationalising the India-US civilian nuclear deal, the Prime Minister has said that he does not think the deal has reached the end of the road. Addressing a joint news conference with German Chancellor Angela Merkel in New Delhi last week, Dr. Manmohan Singh said in re¬sponse to a question, “I would not like to speculate on what would be the consequences if there is some delay, but I do not think we have reached the end of the road on the nuclear deal.”



Accepting that “we have run into some problems domestically with the 123 agreement which we have signed with the United States”, the Prime Minister said “which we are trying to resolve.”



The Prime Minister said, “We are trying to evolve a broad¬based national consensus and are committed to see that the pro¬cess is carried forward. We are a democracy and in a democracy, you have to take along all those who are supporting you.”



The Prime Minister, however, refused to speculate whether the deal would go through in its present form even if there was a delay.



Significantly, the Prime Minister’s remarks came on a day when the US expressed optimism over operationalisation of the deal, hoping that it would ultimately go through the Indian democratic process. US Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson, who met the Prime Minister in New Delhi on Oct. 29, said at the Fortune Global Forum meeting, “I am an optimist. I think good ideas automatically get done.” He said, “India is a vibrant democracy, the democratic process has to work. The deal is possible when India moves forward.” Paulson said, it was important to get the nuclear deal implemented as soon as possible because it would be good for India’s energy security and infrastructure in addition to helping meet the country’s need for clean energy sources.



Expressing Washington’s commitment to the deal, Paulson, who met the West Bengal Chief Minister Buddhadeb Bhattacharjee earli¬er, said the deal was an important part of the Indo-US relation¬ship. Making a strong pitch for early conclusion of the deal, the visiting high-profile former US Secretary of State Henry Kissinger warned that a delay could impact upon prospects of such an agreement in future. Kissinger said India must implement the deal “for its own reasons” and not “as a favour to” or “under pressure” from the US.



If the agreement is not completed during the tenure of the Bush Administration, “the new administration in 2009 will negotiate a new agreement and submit it for Congress’ approval and the same steps would repeat,” Kissinger said at a seminar in New Delhi. Those opposed to the deal would be better organised two years from now,” he said.





Kissinger earlier said that India’s inability to clinch the deal’s operationalisation would adversely impact its trustwor¬thiness internationally.





Let nuclear deal go through : Kissinger urges BJP



On Monday, Oct. 29, Kissinger met senior BJP leader L.K. Advani as part of an exercise to remove the party’s misgivings on various aspects of the India-US nuclear deal. On the same day, US Ambassador to India, David Mulford met BJP president Rajnath Singh.



Issues related to the civil nuclear deal and other aspects of bilateral relations are understood to have figured during the Kissinger-Advani meeting. Dr. Kissinger, a Nobel laureate and Republican Secretary of State during the controversial presidency of Richard Nixon, is believed to have impressed upon Advani the need and desirability of allowing the deal to go through. The 45-minute meeting came a day after Kissinger pressed for imple¬mentation of the nuclear deal, saying questions could be raised over India’s trustworthiness if it fails to push it.



Meanwhile, Mulford who met Advani the previous week, drove to Rajnath Singh’s residence and held an hour-long meeting with him to “understand the party’s concerns as well as its position on the nuclear deal.” The US envoy explained in detail the “highlights” of the deal and “provided an overview” of its vari¬ous clauses. Rajnath Singh, in turn, highlighted his party’s concerns over the deal, particularly issues relating to India’s strategic programme, right to conduct nuclear tests and its impact on the country’s independent foreign policy.



In a significant shift in nuancing its concerns, the BJP conceded it is ready to allow the deal to go through if it is convinced that the military programme will not be affected.





For political leadership to close deal : Kissinger



In an interaction during a discussion on the Emerging Power Centres of the World, organised by the Aspen Institute in New Delhi on Oct. 30, Dr. Kissinger said, “it is up to India’s polit¬ical leadership to conclude the nuclear deal.” He said if the deal fell through during the Bush Administration, it would have to be negotiated afresh by the next Administration. He indicated that the deadline may not extend beyond Jan. 2008.



Dr. Kissinger said in a changing international order that requires global solutions, the fundamental interests of the United States and India run parallel; their destinies are linked and they must work together towards lasting world peace. He said the centre of gravity had shifted from the Atlantic to the Indian Ocean and the Pacific, and China and India were the new emerging powers, economically and politically.



The United States’ friendship with India was not comparable to the one it had with China. Washington and New Delhi had not come closer to contain Beijing.



“The U.S.-India partnership is not dictated by any agreement but by their common interests in an international system that is characterised by a series of changes.”



The sovereignty of the state had diminished with revolutions taking place in different parts of the world that required to be dealt with globally.



Dr. Kissinger called for a revision of the Security Council as its permanent members were not comfortable with the new power shift. The question of veto power must also be addressed. “There are changes in the established order within which the economic order is becoming globalised and the political order is following a different route. But the political order has to handle the economic order. How it is to be done is a new challenge that the world faces,” he said.





Nuclear deal should move fast : US Treasury Secretary



US Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson who visited New Delhi and Kolkata last week, has said that his government has been encouraging India to go forward with the nuclear deal as quickly as possible. Speaking in Kolkata on Oct. 28, he said India will have to work through its “internal political decisions” regarding the deal. Paulson visited Amtala in South 24 Parganas District to participate in a private sector initiative aimed at bringing financial services directly to the people in rural areas. Later, he held a 45-minute meeting with Chief Minister Buddhadeb Bhat¬tacharjee at the Secretariat. They reportedly discussed the nuclear deal as well as prospects of US investment in the state and greater bilateral cooperation in trade and commerce. Paulson also met External Affairs Minister Pranab Mukherjee and some industrialists over lunch.





123 agreement not acceptable in present form : BJP



American interlocutors continued canvassing for the nuclear deal with the BJP leadership last week in a bid to get the 123 agreement clear passed the hurdle created by the Left parties. Former US Secretary of State Henry Kissinger and US Ambassador to India David Mulford met BJP leaders on Monday, Oct. 29, as part of the effort.



The BJP leaders are, however, said to have conveyed to the US that the 123 agreement in its present form was not acceptable to the party. Speaking to media persons after his meeting with Mulford, BJP president Rajnath Singh said, “We have already stated our concerns related to strategic sovereignty, i.e. the freedom to conduct nuclear tests if our security situation so demands, independence of foreign policy and the need for Parlia¬ment to conduct an informed debate on the deal.”



Rajnath Singh said that there was no re-think in the party on the deal. It was not about to enter into any agreement with the Congress to support it in Parliament. “We are in the Opposi¬tion. We will oppose it if a vote is taken.”



Asked why former Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee an¬nounced in 1998 a “voluntary moratorium” on further testing and offered a legally binding agreement on this, Singh said there was a big difference between a “voluntary” decision and one that was arrived at as a result of an agreement with another country. The “voluntary” moratorium would not have come in the way of further testing if the needs of the security situation demanded a new test.



Senior party leader Venkaiah Naidu said: “We are not blindly anti-American. But the Centre did not show any transparency on the deal; it was not discussed properly with parties.”



Observers, however, see signs of the BJP slowly softening in favour of the Indo-US nuclear deal. In an interview with the Hindi daily Dainik Bhaskar on Oct. 28, Rajnath Singh said the BJP could even support the government on the deal if his party’s concerns were addressed.



On the face of it, the BJP is furious with both Prime Min¬ister Manmohan Singh and Congress president Sonia Gandhi for “insulting” the BJP publicly time and again. “How can we ever work together with the Congress, especially on such an important matter?” a BJP source asked.



However, Rajnath Singh’s admission that the BJP could be willing to change its position, though with some conditions, is more likely a result of several factors, including the more obvious one of US pressure. Both at home and abroad, the BJP’s key constituency is pro-US, and this segment does not want to upset America.



One BJP analyst even felt that the party could support the Congress in sending the deal to the International Atomic Energy Agency, bypassing the Left and keeping its core pro-US relation¬ship intact.



But, for that to happen, the BJP analyst said, the Congress would have to open serious negotiations with the BJP leadership, and it was still a moot question whether Sonia Gandhi was will¬ing to do that.





BJP condemns Left for ‘looking after China’s interests’



In a bid to distance itself from the Left in opposing the nuclear deal, the BJP on Nov. 2 questioned the CPI(M)’s patriotic credentials. The party said that the CPI(M) gave primacy to Chinese interests and national interest was only secondary to them. BJP spokesperson Ravi Shankar Prasad was responding to CPI(M) general secretary Prakash Karat’s Statement that the US was using India to counter China’s emergence as a world power. He said Karat’s comments exposed the duplicity of the CPI(M) and established that for the CPI(M) the interests of China are prim¬ary and that of India secondary.



Ravi Shankar Prasad said the BJP does not oppose ties with the US and is opposing the nuclear deal only on the ground that it endangers the future of India’s strategic programme.





CPI(M) against strategic ties with US : Karat



CPI(M) general secretary, speaking in Kolkata on Nov. 1, said that the party is committed to opposing the strategic al¬liance between India and the United States. He said any such move would be meant to ‘counter-balance and encircle China.’



Speaking at a function to mark the 90th anniversary of the Soviet Revolution, Karat made no mention of the nuclear deal but underlined his ideological opposition: “We shall not rest in our fight till strategic ties with the US are snapped.”



He said that the sole strategy of the US was to capture the Indian market. And why does US wish to “capture” the Indian market? “Because China will be equal to the US in terms of econo¬my and growth by the middle of this century,” Karat said, “so China has to be encircled.” He said the US was trying to make India its strategic ally to counter China, “the most powerful socialist country capable of challenging the might of the USA”.



He said the Government is aware of this “US hegemony” but prefers to remain silent.



“USA has also changed its tactics of making Pakistan its strategic ally as it has now realised that if it can get India as a strategic ally, the balance will be tilted in favour of imperi¬alism and neo-colonialism”, he said.



The strategic document of the US administration recognised China as a major threat to US hegemony, Karat said.



Speaking in Kolkata on Nov.2, Karat said he hoped that the November 16 meeting of the United Progressive Alliance-Left committee on the India-United States nuclear cooperation agree¬ment would “arrive at some conclusions.”



“We are prepared to have as many meetings [as are required] to come to a conclusion on how to resolve the issue,” he told journalists.



“Nobody has said that this [the coming] meeting is the last,” he said. There was need for a “serious effort by the committee” to arrive at a conclusion. “We are prepared to spend as much time as is necessary, as we consider it a vital matter.”



“We are not talking of withdrawal of support [to the govern¬ment]... The point is that the government will operationalise the deal only after taking into account the findings of the [UPA-Left] committee,” Karat said in reply to a question whether his party was considering such a move.



“We are also looking towards discussions on the nuclear deal in the winter session of Parliament though we are not insisting on one on a voting resolution; it can be a non-voting resolution,” Karat added. “Parliament’s view on the deal should be elicited. We have an opportunity for that in the coming ses¬sion,” he said.



To a question on the possibility of a “third alternative” being forged, he said, “We have an understanding of a third alternative as a broad-based platform for common policy issues - a wider and deeper arrangement which is not an electoral compul¬sion or requirement.”



It would take some time and they were working towards a more long-term prospect.





No snap poll : CPI(M)



Earlier, CPI(M) leader Jyoti Basu said the Left wanted the government at the Centre to continue.



Jyoti Basu said there was no possibility of any snap poll for the Lok Sabha in the near future. He said he had detailed discussions with Prakash Karat on the progress of the Left par¬ties’ talks with Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and External Affairs Minister Pranab Mukherjee and was of the view that the UPA Government would complete its full five years. The veteran leader hoped that the UPA would henceforth function as per the Common Minimum Programme on which the Left parties decided to support the Congress led government at the Centre.





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PM’s integrity unquestioned, Govt. should last full term : Karat



In what observers regard as the first public overture to Prime Minister Manmohan Singh since the standoff between the UPA and the Left on the nuclear deal started, CPI(M) general secre¬tary Prakash Karat on Oct. 30 emphasised the Left’s respect for the Prime Minister and appreciated his ‘unquestioned integrity.’ In an exclusive interview with a Kolkata daily, The Telegraph, the CPI(M) chief made it clear that the Left wanted the UPA Government to complete its full term in office and there was no question of ‘smelling blood or hounding the Government’, for the rest of its term if it chose survival over the deal.



Karat said he did not agree with those who felt Manmohan Singh should step down if he could not go ahead with the agree¬ment or that there was a basic lack of trust between the Left and the Prime Minister.



The Prime Minister’s support for the deal stemmed from “strong convictions”, he said, adding: “As far as I am concerned, I appreciate the frank exchange of views we have had on many occasions.”



On the three-month-long face-off, Karat said: “It is true that there has been a basic difference in approach between the Prime Minister and the Left on the nuclear agreement. We recog¬nise that he has strong convictions on the soundness and utility of the agreement. Our differing view on the agreement does not mean that we do not have respect for the Prime Minister. His integrity is unquestioned.”



The CPI(M) general secretary dismissed the view that Singh would lose prestige if he continued in office by giving up the deal.



“As the Prime Minister heading a coalition government with¬out the backing of a parliamentary majority for the deal, his not going ahead despite his firm conviction that it is a good deal will not detract from his stature,” he said, adding: “This situa¬tion (of leaders not having their way) is well understood in coalition politics around the world.”



Karat had a special word of praise for the statements made by Sonia Gandhi and Manmohan Singh at the Hindustan Times summit earlier last month when they both spoke out against early elections.



The CPI(M) leader said: “We are also of the view that there should not be early elections and there is no reason why the UPA government should not complete its full term. The remarks made by the Prime Minister and Sonia Gandhi should be appreciated as they have not made the nuclear deal a make-or-break issue.”



On whether those remarks meant that the deal was on hold indefinitely, Karat gave a guarded reply: “As it stands, the government has said it will operationalise the deal taking into account the findings of the committee. So, if not indefinitely, they are not proceeding till the committee is there.”



But the tenor of his remarks indicated that if the govern¬ment gave in to the Left on the deal, the rest of the UPA’s term would be relatively smooth.



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Consensus possible : CPI



A day after publication of the Prakash Karat interview, CPI

general secretary A.B. Bardhan said, “We have not made any aspersions on the Prime Minister; our difference is on policies. As for findings of the UPA-Left Committee, he said, “ I do not rule out a consensus.”



Speaking to newspersons in New Delhi on Nov. 1, Bardhan said the nuclear deal was not in national interest and would drag India into US global strategy. The CPI national council on Nov. 1 took exception to senior US officials coming to India to con¬vince the political leadership about the nuclear deal.



Bardhan said the issue should be debated in Parliament and the sense of the House on the nuclear deal should be taken into account by the Government.





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Nuclear deal to dominate Winter Session



The Indo-US nuclear deal is expected to dominate the pro¬ceedings of Parliament during the Winter Session which is to begin on Nov. 15. The session will continue upto Dec. 7. Par¬liamentary Affairs Minister Priya Ranjan Dasmunshi said in New Delhi on Oct. 29 that it would be a normal winter session, and not a special one to discuss the nuclear deal, as was being projected earlier.



Normally the Winter Session of Parliament starts in the third week of November and concludes ahead of Christmas. The adjustment has been made this time in view of the Gujarat Assem¬bly elections scheduled for Dec. 11 and 16.



The session itself would begin on the eve of the next round of consultations between the UPA and the Left on the nuclear deal which should be debated in Parliament if it is allowed to func¬tion. During the Monsoon session, both Houses of Parliament were repeatedly adjourned even as the Congress, the Left parties and the BJP claimed that they wanted a parliamentary debate on the nuclear deal.



Observers say that the session will also be used by politi¬cal parties to score points ahead of the Gujarat Assembly elec¬tions where the stakes are high both for the ruling BJP and the Congress.



Significantly, the AICC session is taking place in New Delhi on Nov. 17, two days after the Winter Session starts.



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Ambassador Ronen Sen apologises



India’s Ambassador to the United States Ronen Sen apologised to Privileges Committees of both Houses of Parliament last week for the “headless chickens” remarks made by him in the course of a media interview. He appeared before the Lok Sabha Privileges Committee on Oct. 29, and before the Rajya Sabha Privileges Com¬mittee on Nov. 2. Ronen Sen is reported to have expressed his “deepest” regret and tendered an “unqualified” apology for the remarks. The Ambassador, according to sources, said it was a casual and off the record conversation over his mobile phone which had been converted into an interview by the journalist concerned. Otherwise, he had turned down requests of many jour¬nalists for interviews.



Regarding the”headless chickens” remark, Ronen said it was not with reference to Parliamentarians. He said that it is a commonly used colloquial expression which he has been in the habit of using very often.



Reports say that while Ronen Sen virtually emerged unscathed in the Lok Sabha Privileges Committee, he was hauled up in the Rajya Sabha Committee by members who were angry with him for targeting some of their colleagues.



Privileges Committees of both the Lok Sabha and the Rajya Sabha will hold separate meetings on Nov. 16 to finalise their views on the issue.