Left to decide timing of withdrawal on Friday

The Left parties would work out the timing and modalities of their pullout during the meeting on Friday.

Gearing up to implement their threat of withdrawing support to the UPA government over the Indo-US nuclear deal, the Left parties would work out the timing and modalities of the pullout during the meeting on Friday.

“We will demand tomorrow from the Government to tell us as to when it is going to the Board of Governors of the IAEA. The question is not whether they are going (to IAEA). The fact that they are going ahead is clear, but when is the question,” CPI General Secretary A B Bardhan told reporters after a meeting of the party’s Central Secretariat in New Delhi.

“There are no two opinions (about the Left decision to withdraw support). Modalities will be decided … we have to write to the President (to declare withdrawal of support) … all these things will be decided,” he said.

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Asked whether the Left parties had any indication as to when the government would move the IAEA, Bardhan said “the government itself is in a hurry. If they are going (to IAEA), they are going within this week … within the next seven, eight or ten days.”

To persistent queries including whether the Left parties would wait for the Prime Minister to return from his visit to Japan to attend the G-8 summit before taking the ultimate step, the CPI leader said “if they tell us they are going on the 5th or 6th, we will withdraw then itself. But in the normal course, we will wait till he comes back.”

Besides the CPI Central Secretariat, the other Left parties — RSP and Forward Bloc, also met in New Delhi on Thursday. The CPI(M) Politburo has already decided to pull the plug the moment the government moved the IAEA Board of Governors to finalise the India-specific safeguards agreement, which is a key step in operationalising the nuclear deal.