Left leaders meet Sonia, PM; reject olive branch

New Delhi: The UPA-Left face-off over Indo-US nuclear deal intensified on Monday night with dramatic developments and Left parties rejecting Government’s plea that it be allowed to engage in negotiations with the IAEA.

CPI-M General Secretary Prakash Karat met UPA chairperson Sonia Gandhi and conveyed the collective view of the Left parties that the government cannot go ahead with any negotiations with the IAEA whose chief Mohammad El Baradei arrived in Mumbai on Monday night.

The 30-minute crucial meeting was also attended by CPI-M leader Sitaram Yechuri, External Affairs Minister Pranab Mukherjee, Defence Minister A K Antony and Sonia’s political secretary Ahmed Patel.

The Government is understood to have sought Left’s permission to go ahead with the nuclear safeguards agreement talks with El Baradei.

Shortly after the Left leaders' meeting with Sonia, the core group of the Congress met at Prime Minister's Race Course residence.

Mukherjee is understood to have conveyed to the Left leaders that it would be merely negotiations with the IAEA and not any attempt at operationalising the deal without completing the discussion process with the allies.

Agencies report Karat made it plain that there was no question of the Left parties allowing any negotiations before all their concerns on the deal are addressed.

The Left leaders also warned that any attempt to bypass the discussions with the Left would have “consequences” and threatened that they may pull the plug if the Government operationalised the deal.

The meeting assumes importance in the wake of Sonia’s sharp but veiled attack on the Left parties opposition to the deal on Sunday where she called the opponents of the deal enemies of the country.

Congress later resorted to a hasty damage control after sharp reactions from the Left but the allies appeared to have been unconvinced.

In all this war of words and speculation of an imminent snap polls, CPI(M) patriarch Jyoti Basu said he has advised Karat and Yechury to listen to Mukherjee and try to see if it is possible to work out a compromise.

Referring to Gandhi's speech, Basu said she spoke well in New York recently but wondered why she adopted a different tone in Jhajjar. He said if Gandhi wanted elections then the Left was also ready to face it, though he did not not prefer snap polls.