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Nuke agreement with US an honorable deal for India: PM

IRNA - Islamic Republic News Agency

New Delhi, Oct 12, IRNA
India-US-Nuke Deal-PM
Indian Prime Minister, Manmohan Singh Friday said the nuclear agreement is an honorable deal that is good for India and good for the world.

Singh said if the Indo-US nuclear deal does not come through, it will be a disappointment.

He was speaking at the two-day Hindustan Times Leadership summit at New Delhi.

Expressing hope that on the nuclear deal, common sense will ultimately prevail, Singh added that the Government was trying to reconcile the divergent points of view on the issue within the ruling coalition.

He added elections are still far away and the government has one- and-a-half years to complete.

The Prime Minister Friday said that his government will last full term.

He said elections are still one and a half year away.

He added that the government is trying to reconcile the divergent points of view on the issue within the ruling combine and expressed hope that common sense will ultimately prevail.

Replying to a question he said the UPA is not a single issue government and lot of unfinished agenda on health, education, infrastructure, agriculture and social security remains to be completed.

In what appeared to be a reference to the imbroglio over the nuclear deal, Singh said, "We cannot assume that the country and the economy will move forward on their own, while we dissipate our energies in meaningless controversies."

He said if the entire time and energy was spent "battling the ghosts of the past", how could work be done efficiently, as he noted that there was a "vast unfinished agenda of development and reform".

Recalling the pressure the government faced in 1991 as it tried to bring about economic reforms, Singh said, "If we had dithered, if we had yielded to our critics, if we were not firm in our resolve, if we had been overwhelmed by self-doubt, we would have taken the country into a whirlpool of despair."

"On the contrary, those reforms unveiled a new era of enterprise and creativity for India. Enveloped by crisis, besieged by political uncertainty, surrounded by anxiety, we imagined an India that can be," he said.

The Prime Minister said that to realise the "India of our dreams, we must show courage in taking actions that the people expect us to take in their long term and best interests".

In what sounded like a word of advice to the detractors of the nuclear deal, he said, "I am fully aware of the dictum that in politics, one must survive short term battles to attain long term objectives. However, we need to work with one eye on long term objectives while meeting day-to-day challenges."
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