India can test, says Pranab

JYOTI MALHOTRA

New Delhi, August 16, 2007 : In an effort to contain the political crisis over the Indo-US nuclear deal rapidly threatening the Left-UPA alliance, External Affairs minister Pranab Mukherjee was pushed to clarify before the Lok Sabha today that India retained the ``sovereign right to rest and would do so if it is necessary in the national interest.’’

Mukherjee’s unusual statement came in the wake of a comment by the US State Department spokesman Sean McCormack widely quoted in today’s newspapers, which pointed out that in the event of a nuclear test by India, ``all nuclear cooperation gets terminated.’’

McCormack’s statement was perfect fuel for the fire currently engulfing the UPA government and it led to the unusual act of the Foreign Minister making a statement to Parliament, defending India’s rights. For a ministry which hardly ever deigns to react to press reports, the MEA was said to be hard put to find the statement on the US State Department website.

Nevertheless, the damage had been done by McCormack and Mukherjee was constrained to tell Parliament that India had an entirely different view on the matter :

``The only restraint is our voluntary unilateral moratorium on nuclear testing, declared by the previous government and being continued by the successor government. There is nothing in the bilateral agreement that would tie the hands of a future government or legally constrain its options. A decision to undertake a future nuclear test would India’s sovereign decision…’’Mukherjee said.

The government is furious at the way the BJP is especially getting its teeth into the UPA jugular, considering it was the one to impose a voluntary moratorium after the 1998 tests.

However, the fact that Mukherjee was persuaded to make the statement today was clearly a manifestation of the pressure the UPA is currently under.

ENDS