UPA-Left committee on N-deal to meet on Tuesday

NEW DELHI: The UPA-Left Committee on the Indo-US nuclear deal would meet here on Tuesday with the Left parties, providing outside support to the Congress-led ministry, sticking to their guns and the government saying it would seek the sense of Parliament on the matter.
       
At their meeting on May six, the UPA and its Left supporters are slated to discuss the state of government's negotiations with the IAEA on an India-specific safeguards agreement for implementing the nuclear deal.
       
"We will consider what the government will report to us on its talks with the IAEA. On that basis, we will take the issue forward," a senior Left leader told PTI when asked about the stand they would take at the upcoming meeting.
       
Asserting that the Left opposition to the Indo-US nuclear deal continued, he said the government was committed to consider the findings of this Committee while taking the next step on the nuclear deal.
       
After the last round of UPA-Left meeting on March 17, the Left parties and the government have been exchanging notes on related issues, but no details are available.
       
Though Left leaders have refused to divulge details about these exchanges, informed sources said these related to several political and technical matters like uninterrupted fuel supplies.
       
Left sources said the government had sent some information on the nuclear issue and they have reiterated their objections to operationalising the deal.
       
The Left has been opposing the deal on the grounds that conditions laid down by the Hyde Act would impinge on India pursuing an independent foreign policy and make it "subservient" to US strategic interests worldwide.
       
Indicating a shift in its stand, the Government has said it would seek "sense of the House" on the stalled deal before it goes to the US Congress for ratification.
       
"Before we go for its ratification in the American Parliament, we will come to Parliament to take the sense of the House even though there is no provision in the Constitution that stands in our way," External Affairs Minister Pranab Mukherjee said recently.
       
His statement appeared to indicate a change in the thinking of the government which had so far maintained that international agreements were solely in the domain of the Executive.
       
However, the Left sources said the government already knows "the sense of opposition to the nuclear deal expressed in both Houses of Parliament. Government has no majority on the issue. What more do they need?"
       
The Left has been joined by opposition BJP and several other parties which have been expressing apprehensions over various aspects of the deal.
       
India had concluded talks with the global nuclear watchdog IAEA on a specific draft safeguards agreement in the last week of February, more than three months after it began the process.
       
The safeguards agreement with the IAEA and a waiver from the 45-member Nuclear Suppliers' Group to enable India participate in nuclear commerce are the two pre-requisites to operationalise the Indo-US civilian nuclear deal, which seeks to end New Delhi's nuclear isolation.
       
India has told the US that it could not go ahead with the deal without a political consensus and efforts were on for reaching the same.