N-deal: Congress downplays CPI-M threat

Congress on Sunday downplayed the Communist Party of India-Marxist threat to withdraw support to the government on the issue of the Indo-US nuclear deal and dismissed as "political" the Left's objections in the matter.

Party spokesman Shakeel Ahmad also refuted the CPI-M charge that going ahead with the deal would help communal forces.

"It is nothing new. This has been the Left stand since long," he said about the CPI-M's latest threat.

Ahmad also disagreed with the CPI-M general secretary Prakash Karat's charge that the Congress-led coalition has not done much to rein in inflation.

He said that the government has taken a series of steps to bring down rising prices of essential commodities in the backdrop of huge increase in international crude prices.

This, he said, has resulted in India having far less inflation as compared to several Asian countries.

Noting that the Congress has always fought communal forces, he insisted that the deal was in the national interest as it would help bridge the massive energy gap.

The nuclear deal should not be seen in isolation from the country's overall energy security, Ahmad said.

Contending that nuclear fuel is cleaner than coal and more reliable than wind, he said developed countries are increasingly going back to nuclear energy as a relatively cleaner fuel option.