New Delhi
4 December 2007
The BJP on Tuesday said that its opposition to the India-United States
nuclear deal stems from its outstanding concerns about nuclear deterrent and
independence of foreign policy.
The party reminded the Manmohan Singh Government that the nuclear deal will need to
be renegotiated if it came to power. "I declare that if we come to power, which we will, we
will re-negotiate the deal," Yashwant Sinha of the BJP said.
"The main issue is credible minimum deterrent, not minimum credible deterrent but the
government does not [seem to] understand," he said in the debate on the India-US
nuclear deal in the Rajya Sabha.
The former minister of external affairs sought to suggest that nuclear deterrent is
maintained not by quantity alone, but quality too. "Weapons is not about numbers alone,
it has to do with quality and technical excellence," he said.
He wondered what will happen to the quality of nuclear deterrent if the option of
conducting a nuclear test is not on the table.
The Rajya Sabha member accused the UPA Government of misleading the nation on
certain key issues, like the right to reprocess fuel, access to high technology, energy
security and ending country's nuclear apartheid.
"All the scientists whom I have spoken to have told me that the nuclear isolation has
proved to be a boon for India," he said. "What apartheid are you talking about?" he
asked, adding that the whole world is wanting to do business with India.
Reading from the Hyde Act and the 123 Agreement, he said that said there was no
assurance of fuel supply for life time for Indian reactors in those documents. "I challenge
and ask where is the assurance of fuel supply in the 123 agreement," he said.
Even the right to reprocess comes with a rider, he said, referring to the dedicated
reprocessing facility India will need to set up. "Even then reprocessing will require a
separate agreement," he said.
On the foreign policy front, he wondered why the Prime Minister did not attend the
Shanghai Cooperation Organisation summits or why he did not sign an agreement for
four additional nuclear reactors with Russia.
Quoting from Prime Minister Manmohan Singh's response at a press conference in
Washington on July 20, 2005, two days after he signed the Joint Statement with US
President George W Bush, the BJP member said that the Prime Minister had stated that
Parliament is sovereign and he will proceed only on the basis of a broad national
consensus.
He also quoted the Prime Minister as saying that the deal would have the support from
"all thinking" segment of the population in the country. He wondered whether all those
opposing the agreement including himself, Sitaram Yechury (CPM), Amar Singh (SP) and
the AIADMK did not belong to the "thinking segment".
Sinha added that while the government makes claim about achieving energy security,
neither the Prime Minister nor the Minister of External Affairs seemed to be bothered
about the cost of the nuclear deal.
He concluded his intervention by saying that the Manmohan Singh Government was
coming under the US pressure as was evident from the recent setback to the Iranian LNG
project and the State Bank of India not honouring letters of credit of Iranian companies.
Arun Shourie, also of the BJP, asserted that the US intends to use the Nuclear Suppliers
Group (NSG) to bind India. It will not only stop transfer of nuclear technology or materials
to India but it could also get the NSG to do so, he said.
He said that the Hyde Act cannot be ignored because successive US presidents will
need to conform to that Act. He also said that Washington and New Delhgi were silent on
which were the binding clauses and which were the non-binding clauses.
Shourie pointed out that unlike the Hyde Act, there is no specific legislation that governs
the 123 Agreement that the US has signed with China. "With China, it is between two
nuclear weapons states," he said.
Shourie voiced his concern over the annual reporting requirements and fallback
safeguards that the US has incorporated because it thinks the International Atomic
Energy Agency may not be competent to carry out inspections.
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