External Affairs Minister Pranab Mukherjee today expressed the hope that the deadlock over the Indo-US civilian nuclear deal would be broken at the UPA-Left meeting to be held on October five. I am hopeful that the issue would get resolved then (at the meeting on October five), Mukherjee told reporters.
Kolkata, Sept 22 : External Affairs Minister Pranab Mukherjee today expressed the hope that the deadlock over the Indo-US civilian nuclear deal would be broken at the UPA-Left meeting to be held on October five. "I am hopeful that the issue would get resolved then (at the meeting on October five)," Mukherjee told reporters.
Mukherjee, who heads the UPA-Left panel formed to resolve the nuclear deal issue, said that at the two meetings of the committee, the UPA has received three notes from the Left on the issue.
"We have already replied to two of them, a third note has come which will be discussed at the meeting on October five," he added.
Mukherjee had on Wednesday termed the second meeting of the panel as "constructive," and said that the talks would continue to iron out differences over the deal.
Meanwhile, former West Bengal Chief Minister Jyoti Basu has added confusion over the Left's stance on the issue saying, "We need nuclear power and there is nothing new in this."
However, he did no made it clear as to whether he was also in favour of a bilateral nuclear deal with the US.
"I had tried getting nuclear power (for West Bengal). At that time, the Centre had said that states that have coal will not get a nuclear power plant. Later, this rule was changed and I had suggested South 24 Parganas district as a location," he said.
Earlier, the Left parties alleged that the United States was pressurising India to go ahead with the bilateral civilian nuclear cooperation deal.
CPI leader A B Bardhan had said that he felt the US was laying down the timetable for the Indian government on the 123 Agreement.
The Left parties have rejected the government's response to the concerns expressed by them over the nuclear deal, saying they were not convinced with the Centre's contention on the issue.
The government had earlier submitted its reply to a five-page note of the Left's objections on the deal.
The UPA-Left committee set up to resolve the differences over the nuclear deal held its first meeting on September 11, with the members outlining the agenda for the discussion.
The committee framed the issue following broad issues for discussion, implications of the Hyde Act on Indo-nuclear 123 Agreement and on the self-reliance in the nuclear sector, implications on foreign policy and security cooperation.
The 15-member panel, which is headed by Mukherjee, comprises of Union Cabinet Ministers, A K Antony, P Chidambaram, Kapil Sibal, Saifuddin Soz, Prithviraj Chavan, Lalu Prasad, T R Baalu and Sharad Pawar; and six Left leaders Prakash Karat, Sitaram Yechury, A B Bardhan, D Raja, Debabrata Biswas and T J Chandrachoodan.
The panel was named after Left, which provides crucial support to the UPA Government, rejected the bilateral nuclear deal with the US, and warned the Government of serious consequences if it went ahead with operationalising the Agreement.
The Government had said that the agreement would be operationalised after taking into account the committee's findings.
ANI