Pranab Mukherjee (top) and Prakash Karat come out of the Prime Minister’s house after discussing the nuclear deal. Pictures by PTI and Rajesh Kumar

Calcutta, Aug. 18: The CPM has called an emergency central committee meeting on August 22-23 to discuss its course of action on the nuclear deal controversy, where leaders from Bengal are expected to argue against a “hasty decision”.

The session has been called to resolve differences that surfaced in the politburo meeting which ended today, sources in the Bengal CPM claimed. But Delhi sources suggested that the meeting was called because the issue is so huge.

The Bengal CPM is against withdrawing support to the government, which was threatened with “serious consequences” over the nuclear deal by CPM general secretary Prakash Karat today.

“Our objective is to change the government’s nuclear policy. As for the question of withdrawing support, there has been no decision,” politburo member and state secretary Biman Bose said at Calcutta airport on his return from Delhi.

Chief minister Buddhadeb Bhattacharjee, who returned on the same flight, declined comment.

The Bengal CPM has a bigger say in the central committee than in the politburo. Bose and Bhattacharjee were the lone leaders from the state at the Delhi meeting after ill-health kept Jyoti Basu, 93, at home.

Bengal’s strength in the 17-member politburo has fallen from five to three after the deaths of then state secretary Anil Biswas and Citu general secretary Chittabrata Mazumdar. In the central committee, however, the state CPM has 15-16 members — about a fourth of the panel’s strength.

Bose was closeted with Basu at the former chief minister’s Salt Lake home for nearly an hour tonight to brief him on the politburo meeting. Basu is learnt to have told him the party should avoid any “hasty decision” on the matter of reviewing its support to the Centre.

Sources close to Basu said foreign minister Pranab Mukherjee, the government’s chief trouble-shooter, had requested the CPM patriarch to intervene. Basu is expected to talk to Karat in a day or two.

The CPM’s Bengal unit has put off its state committee meeting from August 23 to allow members to attend the central committee session.

The party’s state secretariat will meet on Monday to discuss the issue. “We don’t want the BJP to come to power. We don’t want to fall from the frying pan into the fire,” central committee member Benoy Konar said.

Besides, the Bengal CPM doesn’t want a mid-term election at a time it’s getting ready for the panchayat polls next May. Its rank and file have their hands full, anyway, with the ongoing organisational elections from the branch committees upwards.

The party also feels that with its industrialisation drive having triggered a land movement, snap polls can only help the Opposition, particularly the Trinamul Congress.