Trying to tone down his rhetoric a day after the UPA-Left joint statement, CPM General Secretary and Politburo member Prakash Karat lost little time in slamming the “ignorant” media and reminding his audience of Vietnam.Speaking at the Comrade Naren Sen memorial lecture here on Friday, Karat, in a rare admission, said: “We won’t say we are right.The Government has assured us that it will operationalise the agreement only after taking into account the findings of the committee set up to look into the various objections raised. It’s time to wait and watch. Right now, we should not go beyond that.” And then he promptly went beyond that. “We told our UPA partners that we have supported you for three years in the fight against communalism. That was our political priority. But you must not misjudge us in our stand that imperialism is equally dangerous for us,” said Karat. Referring to Prime Minister Mamohan Singh’s earlier remarks that “let history judge the deal,” Karat said: “Our position is very clear. We are not going to be judged by history. We do not want to be judged by history as the party that facilitated the Government to arrive at such a harmful strategic alliance binding on India. We do not want to be part of it. This is the heart of the political crisis now in India.” “In the next few weeks, we will closely watch what how the committee works but finally the issue should be taken to the people,” he said. “We are often told that the people at large often do not understand the intricacy of a nuclear deal. But I can tell for certain that people in Maharashtra know what Enron means to them. From September 4 to September 15, we will agitate, we will take these issues to the people and we know people will come up with the right answers.” Accusing the media of having “been bought over,” Karat said: “We are being branded as pro-China and told that our stand is going to help China. But, in reality, our stand has nothing to do with China. Our stand is sui generis. Even if China, as an NSG member, supports the deal, we will still oppose it.” When the nuclear-powered US warship USS Nimitz anchored at Chennai, the US embassy in Delhi issued a statement describing it as a “landmark event.” “Why it is a landmark, no media asked. They are so ignorant. They are happy with the American embassy press handouts,” Karat said. “The Americans know why it was a landmark. A landmark because we were receiving the Nimitz, which along with Kitty Hawk, formed part of the US Seventh Fleet. These had glorious achievements in heavy bombardment of South and North Vietnam,” said Karat. “Earlier, Diego Garcia was the only place where they could refuel and now Nimitz will visit our ports.”He stressed that the civil-nuclear deal should never be viewed in isolation. “It is not a stand-alone agreement. It’s a quid pro quo for the Defence Framework Agreement of June 2005, signed surreptitiously without taking the UPA partners into confidence.” ‘Findings of panel will be taken into account’ THE Left parties on Friday refused to join issue with External Affairs Minister Pranab Mukherjee, who said operationalisation of the civilian nuclear deal starts only when the 123 agreement is implemented, and let the political committee formed to address their concerns do its work. Meanwhile, CPI(M) Deputy Leader in Lok Sabha Md Salim said “yes” when asked whether operationalisation includes the IAEA talks. Salim said they too go by Thursday’s statement and understand that “the findings of the committee will be taken into account while operationalising the deal. I can’t respond to what the External Affairs Minister said. We are going by Thursday’s statement and also the statement of the party’s Politburo and Central Committee”.
