Number of seats vs number of watts

If it had the numbers, it could have thumbed its nose at the Left, but the UPA Government needs the Communists to shore it up in Parliament. So it decided to play along and “go slow” on taking the next step in the nuclear deal. However, this did not stop Prime Minister Manmohan Singh from freely consorting with Mohammed ElBaradei, chief of the International Atomic Energy Agency, last week. At a luncheon meeting hosted by the PM, the key issue that exercised the experts was India’s long-term energy requirements. Drawn into a subject he so passionately follows, ElBaradei reeled out figures that defied contradiction. The IAEA Director General pointed out that the average global per capita consumption of electricity stood at 2.3 MWH while that of India was a mere 600 KWH. And assuming India went ahead with the Indo-US nuclear deal and used all available energy resources as well, it could catch up with the current world average only by 2030. The numbers are clearly loaded against delay in a country where 30 per cent population still use biomass resources. Reality did bite. But politics was the unseen delegate at the meeting. “We are trying,” was all that a helpless participant could say.