Legacy and policy

The government’s decision to reach out to the BJP leadership in search of a consensus on the nuclear question has been long overdue. At stake is not merely the future of India’s nuclear programme — both civilian and military —but the very credibility of the Indian political class and its ability to unite on core security interests. Despite the fragmentation of the Indian political system in recent years, coalition governments, since the early nineties, have successfully promoted both economic reform and foreign policy adaptation. Yet, at the very moment of a rare diplomatic triumph — the prospect of ending three decades of atomic isolation — India’s political centre is in danger of collapsing.

The blame for this tragedy must be shared by both the Congress and the BJP, which have abandoned the tradition of constant foreign policy consultation established when P.V. Narasimha Rao was the Congress PM and Atal Bihari Vajpayee was the BJP leader of the opposition. It is well-known that Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and the BJP’s L.K. Advani never found the personal chemistry or mutual confidence to insulate at least some of the nation’s grander agendas from the rough and tumble of normal political contestation. Amidst the communist shenanigans of the last few months, the BJP has finally signalled some welcome flexibility on the nuclear issue in recent days. After the national security advisor, M.K. Narayanan, and the chairman of the Atomic Energy Commission, Anil Kakodkar, having addressed whatever concerns the BJP might have had, it is now up to L.K. Advani to rise to the political occasion.

The BJP’s post-meeting statements have sent out mixed signals, but the party must remember that it was the NDA, which it headed, that had conducted nuclear tests in May 1998 and embarked on a path of creative diplomacy, leading the nation to the door of the prestigious club of great powers. It now has no good reason to join the Left and destroy India’s hard-won nuclear liberation. For nearly six decades, the centre of the Indian political establishment was strong enough to prevent fringe groups, quixotic ideologies and extra-territorial loyalties from influencing national foreign policy. The BJP, the only party other than the Congress that fully understands India’s real nuclear imperatives, now has a choice: it can either let the communists have their first and probably fatal stab at an important issue of national security or demonstrate that India has a political centre that holds.