As the date of the crucial meeting of the Left -UPA coordination committee on the nuclear deal approaches, CPI general secretary A B Bardhan has said the Left’s problem is with the Indo-US nuclear deal and not the safeguards agreement with IAEA.“After all, if we have to go ahead with nuclear energy, there’s got to be safeguards. Our problem is with the Indo-US deal and not about the safeguards..not about the NSG either, provided the NSG is not conditional as it is today,” Bardhan said in an interview to Karan Thapar on his programme Devil’s Advocate on Saturday.To a question whether the Left would allow the Government to get a waiver from the Nuclear Suppliers Group (NSG), he said the US was “insisting that there will a waiver only if you agree with the deal. That has been made clear”.Bardhan said the UPA Government was moving on the basis of the Indo-US nuclear agreement. “After all, they need not have done so. You are forgetting that they were declaring their intent to push ahead with the deal regardless of what they are negotiating with the IAEA.”When asked if the Government said they would go to the NSG but not pursue the 123 agreement, Bardhan said let the Government give a statement to that effect.
