Sonia defends PM on nuke deal, ask party to gear up for polls

New Delhi, Aug 14 (UNI) Strongly defending beleagured Prime Minister Manmohan Singh on the Indo-US nuclear deal, Congress President Sonia Gandhi today asked the party cadre to gear up for the assembly elections in Gujarat, Rajasthan, Madhya Pradesh, Chhattisgarh and Delhi.

''Our government has entered into this agreement after tough negotiations. The agreement fulfills all the assurances that the Prime Minister has given repeatedly in Parliament,'' Ms Gandhi said, addressing the general body meeting of the Congress Parliamentary Party (CPP).

She took a swipe at the opposition for the din in the Lok Sabha yesterday which had drowned out Dr Singh's suo motu statement on the deal.

Pointing out that gone were the days when debates and discussions lay at the very core of Parliamentary democracy, she said''Sadly today, disruptions and sloganeering appear to have take over. The latest demonstration of this was just yesterday when the Prime Minister was not allowed to speak on the very important issue.'' She said that in a couple of months, Gujarat would go to the polls and soon thereafter assembly elections would be held in another four states.

''This keeps us on our toes,'' she observed and announced the party was planning to have a national convention of all District Congress Committees followed by a series of regional conventions of DCCs and Block level conventions in different parts of the country.

The conventions would help the office bearers of the party to familiarise themselves with the programmes, policies and achievements of the UPA government.

Ms Gandhi expressed the party's ''collective anguish'' over the floods in Assam, Bihar, Uttar Pradesh, Gujarat and other states and called for sternly dealing with anti-national forces involved in the killing of Hindi speaking people in Assam.

Talking about the agenda before the monsoon session of Parliament, she said landmark Bills would be introduced for providing social security to workers in the unorganised sector and setting up the Indira Gandhi Tribal University.

She expressed the hope that the Rajya Sabha would pass the Warehousing Bill which would help farmers get credit from banks against their produce and prevent distress sales. Another priority was the passage of the Immoral Traffic Prevention Amendment Bill.

The Congress President said she had talked to Maharashtra Chief Minister Vilasrao Deshmukh and he had assured her that ''definite action'' would be taken on the findings of the Srikrishna Commission on 1992-93 communal violence in his state after the demolition of the Babri Masjid in Ayodhya. The ''administrative action will not be discriminatory.'' In this connection, she also referred to the Communal Violence (Prevention, Control and Rehabilitation of Victims) Bill pending in Parliament.

There was need for putting in place a ''more humane and effective'' policy for resettlement and rehabilitation. Her remarks assumes significance in the wake of violent agitations in Singur, West Bengal, and other parts of the country against acquisition of land for setting up factories, special economic zones and other mega projects.

UNI