PM needs to sell deal to the public

NEW DELHI: The Indo-US civil nuclear agreement is a major step forward for the country, and is the only foreign policy achievement of Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, but the government has so far not been able to sell it to the public.

Intervening in the two-day debate on the nuclear issue in Parliament the Prime Minister, on Monday, tried to give a positive spin to the agreement and tried to reassure members that the country's weapons programme will not be placed under international scrutiny.

Singh said the "content and scope" of India's strategic programme was not discussed with the US or any other country. "Our strategic programme will respond to our own decisions and not be subjected to any international scrutiny," he said. Acknowledging that India is not recognised as a nuclear weapons state, as it is  defined in the Nuclear Non Proliferation Treaty (NPT), the new arrangement would place India in a very special category : "But for all practical purposes we are there…   with this status." 

He said till Sunday, India was looked as a pariah in the nuclear order. From Monday, the country has a place in it and there has been a complete make over of the world view about India.

Saying he would be the last person to plead before the House that India' s foreign policy or its policy on Iran should be allowed to be decided at Washington or Europe, Singh pledged that he stand by that commitment.

The deep suspicion of the US, a throwback to the decades of the Cold War when New Delhi and Washington were on opposite sides of the divide, have fuelled much uninformed criticism of the agreement.   The Prime Minister said that  "difficult negotiations lie ahead" and the broad approach of India is on public record and guided by the assurances made by him to Parliament on several occasions.