Dr Singh does a Mr Rao

By December 1995, the nuclear explosive was ready and had been lowered into the L-shaped hole in the Pokharan desert. As the US intelligence picked up the signals of an impending test, the Clinton Administration formally reminded Rao of the costly political consequences. And for good measure, the Clinton Administration leaked the story to the 8220;New York Times8221; which published it on December 15.

For three days, the Rao government was like a 8220;headless chicken8221;, unwilling to either deny or confirm the report. Unable and unwilling to face up to the pressures, Rao called off the nuclear test barely 48 hours before it was to have occurred.

Like Rao, Manmohan Singh did all the hard work necessary for changing India8217;s nuclear standing in the world and regaining access to global atomic energy markets that had it been shut out for nearly three and a half decades. At the political level, the nuclear deal was about breaking the nuclear parity with Pakistan and regaining strategic equivalence with China.

But unlike Rao, Manmohan Singh did not have to face a hostile international environment. All the world8217;s leading powers, except China, had lent political support to India8217;s full-fledged entry into the nuclear club.

For three months now, what stood between India and its long-standing national objectives was a simple negotiation of a safeguards agreement with the International Atomic Energy Agency. Informal consultations with the IAEA in recent months had apparently indicated a viable understanding was within reach.

The Bush Administration was all geared up to get the IAEA approval as well as the endorsement of the 45-nation Nuclear Suppliers Group by December. Although the US Congress would have taken a while to vote on it, the Russians and French were all set to announce civilian nuclear cooperation with India 8212; during Manmohan Singh8217;s visit to Moscow next month and the French President Sarkozy8217;s trip to New Delhi in January.

It is at this very moment that Sonia Gandhi and Manmohan Singh have snatched a political defeat from the jaws of victory. The CPM leader Prakash Karat8217;s objections to the deal in the final phase of its implementation have been interpreted in many ways. He was merely sticking to his own ideology, rigid and outdated as it might be.

In the end it was a political test for the Congress. Was it was ready to put national interest above political expediency? After their initial bravado, Sonia Gandhi and Manmohan Singh were not even willing to take the test. They have called in sick.

Sections of the BJP understood from the very outset that the Congress lacked the political courage to complete India8217;s unfinished nuclear agenda. Opportunistic as its opposition to the nuclear deal was, the BJP recognised that the Congress leadership would crack under sustained pressure.

The Congress8217;s reluctance to make bold on foreign policy has put more than India8217;s ties with the US at risk. The UPA was fortunate to inherit an extraordinary foreign policy legacy from the NDA government. Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee had done a lot of the hard work to end the nuclear dispute with the United States, negotiate purposefully with Pakistan on the Kashmir question, and find a way to resolve the boundary dispute with China.

The UPA government did pick up the ball and run; but has tripped itself at the goal post. As on the nuclear initiative with the US, so on the Kashmir negotiations with Pakistan, the UPA government abandoned the many opportunities that came its way during 2005-06 with Gen. Pervez Musharraf. The negotiations with China have made little progress in the last few years.

If the Congress does not have the conviction to complete the nuclear deal, so patently tilted in India8217;s favour, there is no hope in hell it will muster the gumption to proceed further with Pakistan and China on issues that necessarily involve territorial concessions.

To be sure, India will have to bear the short term diplomatic costs of the UPA government8217;s nuclear vacillations. Over the longer term, though, India should survive the UPA8217;s feckless foreign policy. After all, the US civil nuclear initiative was not a favour to the Congress but a recognition of India8217;s increasing weight in the international system.

If the Congress cannot or will not make consequential decisions for the nation, its successors might me less constrained. Just as Rao8217;s decision to blink in December 1995 allowed Vajpayee to get all the nuclear credit in May 1998, the UPA8217;s failure today will be some one else8217;s victory down the road.

The writer is a Professor at the S. Rajaratnam School of International Studies, Nanyang Technological University, Singapore