Nuke deal ? Sattaa deal

The full court press is on from Uncle Sam. Condoleezza Rice speaks to Pranab Mukherjee. Paulson calls on Manmohan Singh and Buddhadeb. Kissinger meets Advani. Mulford meets Rajnath Singh.

The message is simple: India will become an international pariah if the nuke deal is reneged. Also, skeletons will start falling out of Antonia’s cupboard if she doesn’t play the nuke deal game with Westinghouse and GE waiting on the wings (with their Japanese corporate mukhada) to enter the power market, a la Enron.

Karat is busy cobbling up support from MuKa, Chandrababu, Mulayam for the Left’s mating dance, apart from getting the statements of Laloo and Sharad Pawar presenting their true colors as guardians of sattaa. Anything goes just to stay in sattaa. Karat has goofed up big time by playing for high stakes on the deal little realising that it will be political suicide for the left in West Bengal, to go for early elections in 2008.

The substantive issues about the deal are given the go-by in all this grandstanding by chickens (read: chamcha-s in the vernacular idiom) and headless chickens (read: jaalra-s in the vernacular idiom).

Breath-taking silence ensues awaiting the arrival of the Italian prima donna after the self-proclaimed triumphant tour to woo Hu, hoping that Hu will prevail upon Karat to sing a different tune during the mating dance which will be performed, for public edification, between Nov. 15 to Dec. 24 during the winter session of Parliament.

The polity is in shambles. Constitution is a torn piece of paper. Nobody seems to be in charge in the ongoing anarchic deliberative processes on an issue which was touted by scientists and policy spoofs to be the deal of the century, heralding a new energetic India (with energy generation getting augmented by 40,000 MW of nuke-based power from imported reactors and purchased uranium).

Little is said about energy independence by promoting thorium-based fast-breeder reactors, a plea echoed by Kalam and PKS Iyengar, two scientists who exemplify the nation’s conscience with national interest governing their recommendations.

Now, back to political grandstanding. What are the chances that Antonia will call on Advani and Rajnath Singh and beg for the latters’ support for the nuke deal after announcing that that mating dance with Karat is aborted?

What are the chances that Laloo, Sharad Pawar and MuKa will fall in line with the Antonia move to stay in power for a few more months, but without Karat backing, but with Advani-Rajnath aquiescence? After all, every month of being in power means a lot, in financial terms, to continue to loot the nation’s wealth.

In all this nataka of the criminalised polity, nation’s wealth being looted receives little attention. Just look at the media coverage of the 19 page FIR lodged in Madurai Bench of Madras HC about the loot of thorium reserves from the placer sands south of Rama Setu, from the mines of Manavalakurihci, to be precise? It is too much to expect the rotten polity to take care of nation’s wealth, in the face of a loot which is larger than the colonial loot. And, there is no talk even of a mines and minerals policy for the state.

In such a dismal state, what remedy does the aam janataa have? Wait for the next ballot in mid-2008? And, vote on bouts of saaraayam or even hard currency delivered in envelopes at doorsteps as it happened during the Madurai Lok Sabha by-election?

Pundits are busy coming up with numbers of parliamentarians for and against the nuke deal and the predictions of swings in voting patterns.

We have not yet come to grips with the fact that there is a larger issue, that of the rashtram. That of the rashtram in protecting dharma and hence, achieving abhyudayam. Bharatam Vision 2020 is door aast. It is a long 13 years ahead. Shame on the polity that it does not seem to care for the abhyudayam of future generations of this young nation and for the rinam that the nation owes to the pitr-s who have bequeathed a way of life governed by dharma.

Now, back to the nuke deal. Since I have been asked to predict on how things will pan out, let me hazard a guess. The IAEA negotiations will resume on Christmas eve, that is after Dec. 24 when the Parliament adjourns. NSG contacts will be established and the deal will be operationalised by end-January by a minority government, headed by the substitute PM Manmohan Singh assisted by Kanimozhi (replacing TR Baalu) and Rahul Gandhi (the returnee from the China trip) as cabinet ministers without portfolio, Ambika Soni as Congress spokesperson without a cabinet position.

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