Even as the Left sticking to its stand on nuclear deal, the Atomic Energy Commission chairman Anil Kakodkar is all set to travel to Vienna in September to attend a meeting of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) general conference and discuss India-specific safeguards agreement, that will govern its civil nuclear facilities.
According to officials, “though the scheduled meeting of the board of governors of the IAEA is routinely held, this time round it is of significance as India-centric safeguards will be discussed in view of the India-US civil nuclear agreement.” While Kakodkar will be leaving next month for meetings in the IAEA, Prime Minister’s special envoy on the deal Shyam Saran is already touring major NSG countries including Russia, Germany and Brazil, in an effort to seek their support for an unconditional waiver for India to trade in N-goods.
The news has not gone down well with the Left parties, which registered their opposition once again on Monday. The Left parties, want a halt in the operationalisation of the deal and negotiations with IAEA and NSG until objections to the agreement were taken care of. In fact, hardliners in the Left contend that the divorce between the Left and the UPA may now be a matter of time. They maintain that the joint meeting of the Left parties on Monday also went into the spectre of a mid-term poll and contend that a formal announcement of withdrawal of support could come in the third week of September if the government refused to heed to its demands.
“The rallies of the Left parties to begin on September 4 against the quadrilateral naval exercise will explain the circumstances that brought to this conflict with the UPA government,” a senior Left leader told FE after the meeting. Placing the ball again to the Centre’s court, he also said that once the government moves ahead with attending the IAEA’s annual conference, to be held from September 16, withdrawing the support will “also be automatic.”
The Left has also expressed reservations with the government’s intention to discuss the nuclear deal with Japan, a member of the nuclear suppliers’ group. Apparently in a demonstration of the Left’s protest, CPI-M sources said the party general secretary Prakash Karat will not be attending a dinner here on Tuesday to honour Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe. “We won’t allow the government to talk the nuclear agreement formally or informally with the IAEA or the NSG,” a senior politburo member said.
The UNPA, meanwhile, finding the deadlock over the deal as an opportunity to corner Congress, has reitearated their demand for a parliamentary approval of the deal. “We are in touch with the Left parties. They have said that sense of the House should be taken on the deal. This is the best way for that,” Samajwadi Party general secretary Amar Singh, who was flanked by TDP’s Yerran Naidu and AIADMK’s V Maitrayan, said. Branding the deal as a “slave treaty” and a “unilateral” decision taken by the government, the alliance also demanded the setting up of a joint parliamentary committee (JPC) to look into the matter.
In another development, Rajya Sabha chairman Hamid Ansari too has rejected BJP’s demand for a discussion on the issue under Rule 168, which entails voting, saying that parliamentary nod is not necessary for an international treaty. The BJP however said, it would continue pressing for discussions on the issue in both the Houses of parliament, as it planned to serve fresh notices under rules in the respectives Houses, which entail voting. “We will again approach the presiding officers of both the House with our notices. We will rephrase our notices in consultation with them,” senior BJP leader VK Malhotra said.
