By Xinhua
Washington : In comments that have caused a storm back home, India’s envoy to the US Ronen Sen has alluded to critics of the Indo-US nuclear deal as “headless chicken” who do not understand the worth of the agreement.
In an interview to Rediff India Abroad, Sen said that Indian negotiators had done an “absolutely unprecedented” job and that New Delhi would have “zero credibility” if it insisted on a rewording of the Hyde Act.
Saying the nuclear pact “has been approved here (in Washington, DC) by the President and there (in New Delhi) it’s been approved by the Indian cabinet,” he asked: “So why do you have all this running around like headless chicken, looking for a comment here or comment there, and these little storms in a tea-cup?”
Sen said he couldn’t understand why Indians “don’t have a little bit of confidence” and added that he was amazed over the political storm in New Delhi following the communists’ threat to jettison the United Progressive Alliance (UPA) government over the nuclear agreement.
“I can understand (such a debate) immediately after independence,” he said. “But 60 years after independence! I am really bothered that 60 years after independence, they are so insecure — that we have not grown up, this lack of confidence and lack of self-respect.”
Sen, a leading backer of the agreement and the architect behind the resurrection of the 123 Agreement, warned that if the deal fell through, the implications would be grave for Indo-US ties and the entire broad-based agenda envisaged between the two countries would be adversely impacted.
“If you really look at it (the 123 Agreement), every single (concern) has been met,” particularly with regard to reprocessing and assurances of fuel supplies to India’s reactors even in the hypothetical case of India conducting a nuclear test, even though there has been no mention of testing in the text, he said.
“What is in the agreement which they are not satisfied with?” he asked, obviously referring to the Indian opposition parties as well as the communists. “Not one,” adding that such a pact was unprecedented in Indian history.
“There has been no parallel of a single country exemption to any of the international regimes, not in the 21st century, the 20th, 19th, 18th, 17th, 16th, in any century. All what we are doing is absolutely unprecedented.”
Sen said he couldn’t understand the argument that India was getting too close to the US.
“We are talking of the leading technological country in the world” which everybody else seems to have cottoned on to, “but our people have not or maybe they don’t want to believe it”, he remarked.
The ambassador said that the Hyde Amendment — which has already been signed into law and which is the focus of the Indian opposition – could not be renegotiated.
He added that it would be a pity if the agreement was not operationalised before the end of the Bush Administration’s tenure because, as in Prime Minister Manmohan Singh’s words, there has not been and unlikely to be in the near future a president as friendly and supportive of India as George W. Bush.
He also said what the critics of the deal don’t apparently comprehend was “the enormity of this change” in the US attitude towards India, that the same US that had taken the lead in setting up the Nuclear Non-proliferation Treaty regime after New Delhi first detonated a nuclear device in 1974 was now taking the lead again to exempt India from the regime.
Sen argued that it was because of the excitement over this deal and what it could envisage for the strategic partnership between the US and India that had resulted in the proliferation of visits to India by leading CEOs of American companies.
“So nothing happens by accident. It’s not just symbolic. It’s much, much more. But will we be able to get benefits out of all that, without this (nuclear agreement)?”
“All of this is inter-linked. We cannot insulate this. People don’t seem to realise that.”
Meanwhile, the US has said it would work with New Delhi to hopefully see their civil nuclear deal to fruition, while refraining from any comment that may further muddy the political waters in India.
“We don’t have any specific comments on discussions within India about the agreement. This is a determination for the Indians to make. We’re going to be working with them to hopefully see it to fruition,” State Department spokesman Gonzalo R. Gallegos said Monday.
Asked to clarify Washington’s stand in the event of India testing a nuclear weapon, he merely referred to the on record comments made by regular department spokesman Sean McCormack saying: “I don’t really have anything different or additional to add to that.
“And I think that obviously this is an important agreement that we believe will help India reduce its energy shortfall and will allow Indians to gain access to advanced technologies that will improve their daily lives. So we’re working towards that end, coordinating with the Indians, coordinating with our Congress, and we hope to move forward on that,” Gallegos said.
“I’ll refer you back to Sean’s comments on that. I know that he went on the record with that. I know that he’s been standing by those comments, and I’ll just have to refer you to them,” he said, when asked about what options the US president has under the implementing 123 Agreement in the event of a nuclear test.
McCormack himself had tacitly conceded last week that as a sovereign nation India has the right to conduct or not conduct a test, but said Washington does not encourage any states to test atomic weapons.
“The whole issue is India is sovereign, but we’re not encouraging any states to test at this point,” he said, without asserting as he had in comments made to a couple of reporters that a test by New Delhi would lead to scrapping of the deal.
McCormack’s reported blunt assertion that a test by India would lead to scrapping of the deal does not find a mention in the State Department transcript for the day as it was made in comments after the regular briefing.