Indo-US n deal: Left sticks to No, UPA in deep crisis

New Delhi, Jun 29 (UNI) The 50-month-old UPA-Left political arrangement at the Centre to keep the communal forces at bay seemed to be tottering today with the CPI(M) announcing that it would withdraw support to the Congress-led coalition if it went ahead '' its abject surrender on the nuclear deal.'' The Left parties will '' launch a nationwide campaign unitedly to expose the government's surrender of national interests on the nuclear pact and its total failure to curb price rise,'' CPI (M) General Secretary Prakash Karat said at the end of the day-long Polit Bureau meeting here.

He made it clear that as and when the government went ahead with the deal his party in concert with the other Left parties will withdraw support to the UPA government.

The Left parties will unitedly launch a country-wide intense campaign to expose the Congress-led government's insistence on the deal at the diktat of the US and its refusal to concede to the Left suggestions to curb price rise.

At a news conference Mr Karat chose to just read out a written statement on behalf of the party Polit Bureau and not field any questions.

A Left source told UNI that now the battlelines have been drawn as the government had virtually closed doors on the Left on the deal.

This is the first time that the CPI(M) has also dragged in the Congress leadership for showing more concern about fulfilling its commitment made to US President George Bush to operationalise the nuclear deal.

Mr Karat in the party mouth piece, People's Democracy, had earlier squarely blamed Prime Minister Manmohan Singh for plunging the nation into a political crisis by his obsession with the deal.

The government seemed to be determined to go ahead with the deal and keep floating with the support of the Samajwadi Party of Mulayam Singh Yadav's 39 MPs at the expense of the Left parties who have as many as 59 MPS in the Lok Sabha, the source said.

While the recent past witnessed political parleys between the government and the Left leaders to break the impasse on the deal, no tangible result came out.

The flashpoint came on June 25 after the meeting of the UPA-Left panel on the Indo-US nuclear deal, when both sides dispersed abruptly even without fixing the next date of the next meeting.

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