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Storm in a tea cup
Kuldip Nayar writes from New Delhi

I wish the Left had made national development, not the Indo-US nuclear deal, an issue for parting ways with the ruling Congress. Probably, the Left felt that it would not be convincing if it were to do so after having dotted i's and crossed t's in more or less all the decisions that Manmohan Singh government took in the past three and a half years. Till now, the Left, particularly the CPI (M), has been having vicarious satisfaction of governing, sorting out names for India's president and appointing the vice-president.

Even today, the Left could have created a rumpus over the increase in the number of poor in the country. It could have taken the government to task on the data revealed by its appointed commission on the Unorganised Sector. The report says that 836 millions, 87 percent of India's population, live on Rs 20 (half a dollar) or less per person per day.

For reasons best known to the Left, it chose the nuclear deal. Politically, it misfired. One, the Left found itself on the side of the BJP. Two, a few hours before the Left rejected the deal, China had threatened that "either the Indo-US nuclear deal will fall or the Manmohan Singh government." Was there any telepathy?

If any country, leave America apart, had made the observation which China did, the Left and its camp followers would have been up in arms. The remark would have been considered interference in India's domestic affairs. Yet, there was not even a whimper in the Left quarters, much less criticism. They felt important by giving repeated statements on how India's sovereignty would be circumscribed if the deal went through. Little did they realise that sovereignty rested with the people in a country. It was from within, not without. How could America or, for that matter, any other country take away, whatever the wording of the deal, our sovereignty?

India became sovereign after untold sacrifices. The nation knows how to defend itself against the different challenges. In their shoddy wrangling, the political parties should not drag in sovereignty, which is something sacred. All American laws, including the Hyde Act, put together cannot enslave us. Nor can Washington's warnings deter us from doing what we want to do. The Left should judge the government on the basis of the steps it takes to implement the prime minister's statement in parliament in July 2005.

We stand by "no-first use," the undertaking given by BJP prime minister Atal Behari Vajpayee. He even announced a moratorium on nuclear tests. The BJP's turnabout, like that of the Left, is political. It has nothing to do with our sovereignty. The Left's animus against America is understandable, but what is the BJP's problem? The latter initiated the whole thing following the unending talks between BJP foreign minister Jaswant Singh and America's I. Talbot, a top functionary in the Clinton government.

The point of concern is not the deal but the manner in which New Delhi is watering down its independent foreign policy, which had come to be known as non-alignment. We, as a nation, lessen ourselves when the US ambassador in New Delhi warns us not to vote against America on the issue of Iran, and we obediently do so. We, too, do not want Iran to have the bomb, and we should support all steps to stop it from developing one.

But what is disconcerting is the general perception that America is dictating us. In the renewal of the cold war atmosphere, New Delhi has to play a role, the independent one that we played when the world was divided into two hostile blocs. How to win back the confidence of small and weak countries is what New Delhi should be thinking, instead of demolishing the consensus on foreign policy we have been having. I am personally against the entire nuclear programme, starting with the bomb. Both Mahatma Gandhi and Jawaharlal Nehru were against making the bomb. I am not sure whether we should have nuclear energy.

Nuclear power houses will be a big hazard. Any leakage, as happened in Europe and Russia, can kill thousands of people. I do not know whether nuclear energy will turn out to be cheaper than the thermal or the hydro one. Billions of dollars need to be invested in nuclear energy. And all this will be in the public sector. We should have concentrated on harnessing water, including the Brahmaputra, with the help of Nepal, Bhutan and Bangladesh. It would have benefited us all economically.

However, the Manmohan Singh government's mind is made up on nuclear energy. In a country like India, where the marginal group consuming less than Rs 15 per person has increased from 290 million to as high as 392 million, nearly 40 percent of population, the priority should have been livelihood, not energy, however important it is for development. The same question arises again: Development for whom?

The political fallout of the nuclear deal is what seems to worry the Congress-led government. Some sort of mechanism has been established to allay the Left's fear. But the confidence between the two has been shaken. The Left also feels that support to the Congress and its policies has eroded its base. This is true. Yet, it looks as if the present crisis over the Indo-US nuclear deal will blow over. The Left is beginning to realise that it would lose heavily if the polls were to take place immediately. Still, as things look today, it is only a matter of time when the distance between the two would become unbridgeable.

A mid-term poll may become unavoidable because even if the government is not pulled down, its credibility would lessen if it is reduced to a minority in the Lok Sabha. The Congress, without majority in the House, can rule as Narasimha Rao did for full five years. The president, who is the Congress nominee, will come in handy. But that does not solve the problem. The minority does not become a majority.

Already moves are afoot to cobble together an alternative. The BJP-headed NDA is willing to extend support to any group that can show how it can reach the magic figure of 273 in the 545-member Lok Sabha. The third combination (United National Progressive Alliance) is all for ousting the Congress-led coalition at the Centre. Again, its problem is that it cannot have a majority.

However uncertain the future scenario, the bottom line is that no political party wants a mid-term poll. The Left has said that it will oppose the government without being a party to the toppling move. There is more heat than substance. When the chips are down, the political crisis may turn out to be storm in a tea cup.

Kuldip Nayar is an eminent Indian columnist.