PM's exception to BJP's attitude on mole issue

New Delhi, Aug 1: Taking strong exception to Mr Jaswant Singh's refusal to name the alleged ''mole'' in the P V Narasimha Rao government who leaked nuclear secrets to the United States, Prime Minister Manmohan Singh today regretted that the attitude of BJP leaders on the issue showed how low that party could stoop for political gains.

Apparently referring to the remarks of Mr Jaswant Singh in the Rajya Sabha today that Dr Singh, who was Finance Minister in the Narasimha Rao government during 1991-96, had opposed a proposal for conducting a nuclear test on economic grounds, the Prime Minister said the BJP should look at its own track record before pointing fingers at him.

In an informal chat with reporters outside the Rajya Sabha at the time when the House was discussing the ''mole'' controversy, Dr Singh said it was the NDA government which had offered to convert India's unilateral moratorium on nuclear tests into a ''de jure'' moratorium.

Further, former US Deputy Secretary of State Strobe Talbott had written in her book that Mr Jaswant Singh had promised her that he would ''deliver India on the CTBT'' (Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty), which New Delhi had all along refused to sign as the treaty was discriminatory and as such against the interest of non-nuclear powers, the Prime Minister said.

Mr Jaswant Singh had named two Americans, Harry Burns and Graham, in connection with the mole controversy, but these two were not part of the American administration in 1991-96, Dr Singh said.

This sort of attitude was not expected of a leader who had held the portfolios of Defence, Finance and External Affairs, the Prime Minister said.

UNI