By IANS
New Delhi : With the Gujarat elections set to end in a week, the Left is doing a flip-flop. It is stiffening its opposition to the India-US nuclear deal but stating publicly that it has no grouse against the government.
Sources in the Communist Party of India-Marxist (CPI-M) say it has no intentions of going soft on the deal despite its okay to talks between the Indian government and the UN atomic watchdog International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA).
“We cannot allow the government to sign the India-US nuclear agreement,” a senior CPI-M leader who did not want to be identified told IANS.
The leader made the comments two days after CPI-M general secretary Prakash Karat reportedly warned the government to choose between the Left and the nuclear deal. But he later denied that he had such a comment.
Karat is said to have told a party meeting that the Left would ask the government not to go ahead with the deal after its talks with the IAEA. “If they go ahead, we will have to be prepared for mid-term polls.”
But the CPI-M officially denies this was said. “Reports about the ultimatum are not correct. We are waiting for the government to return to the (Left-UPA) nuclear committee,” CPI-M politburo member S. Ramachandra Pillai told IANS.
The 15-member nuclear committee, formed to address the concerns raised by the Left over the agreement, had given its nod for the government-IAEA India-specific negotiations. But it insisted that the government should come back to the committee before initialising the safeguards agreement.
Left leaders privately say that the green signal for the talks was a political decision to buy time.
“Both of us – the government and the Left – wanted more time to settle things. The Congress was keen to focus on the Gujarat elections. We also did not want the government to be unstable before the Gujarat polls,” said the Left leader.
The Left wants the government to ensure fuel supplies to Indian nuclear reactors in perpetuity and also continuation of civilian nuclear cooperation as well as India-specific safeguards even if the Indo-US deal is terminated.
Senior Left leaders admit that this was an impossible task – and in the process, minus Communist support, the Indo-US nuclear agenda would derail.
According to Left leaders, the Communists cannot support Prime Minister Manmohan Singh’s government if it signs the nuclear agreement with Washington.
“The government can go ahead if it is prepared for the elections. But our sense is that they are not prepared for the polls now,” said another Left leader.