Manmohan Singh with Fidel Castro in Havana

New Delhi, Sept. 23: The Left parties are pleased as punch with Manmohan Singh.

The Prime Minister has returned from Havana and has regaled Prakash Karat and A.B. Bardhan — general secretaries of the CPM and the CPI — with stories of his meeting with the man who has been the bete noire of successive US Presidents.

“The Prime Minister was totally charmed by Fidel Castro,” says a Left leader.

This is music to the ears of the communists who believe Singh is veering more and more towards the US and George W. Bush.

What is even more pleasant to their ears is the Prime Minister’s observation about Iran President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad. “Manmohan Sin-gh was impressed with the Iranian President. Found him very reasonable and sensible,” said a Left leader.

The Congress-led United Progressive Alliance government’s volte face on Iran at the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) conference has been a sore point with the Left. Its leaders accused Singh of siding with Bush and leaving Iran in the lurch. So Singh’s praise of the Iran President warmed the cockles of the Left’s wounded heart.

During his interactions with Karat and Bardhan yesterday, the Prime Minister narrated how well his meeting went off with Castro. The Cuban leader asked Singh about food production in India, its industrial activities and gross domestic product (GDP). The Prime Minister, an economist, was at home answering these questions. It was after all a subject that he could speak on for hours.

The same was not the case with Jyoti Basu, former chief minister of Bengal. “When Basu met Castro years ago, the Cuban President took him by surprise asking him the cost of cement,” said a Left leader.

All through his meeting with Singh, Castro — who is recovering from a serious illness — was in a wheelchair. When Singh was about to leave, he stood up and summoned the photographers. He wanted them to take photographs of him with the Indian Prime Minister. “One billion people will see this, he told the photographers,” said a Left leader.

Singh also told the Left leaders about his one-hour meeting with Raul Castro, Fidel Castro’s brother and acting President.

“Raul told Singh that Americans are great people but the US establishment is stupid,” said a Left leader. He cited the US invasion of the Bay of Pigs when the US regime thought they “could walk over Cuba”.

The most recent example came from the way they reacted when Castro was taken ill before his 80th birthday. The US establishment, Left sources said, made the same mistake and thought that it was all over for the communists.

The Prime Minister’s trip to Havana and the meeting of the non-aligned countries could not have taken place at a more expedient time. Even a month before, the Left parties were engaged in a tug of war with Singh over the Indo-US nuclear deal and had serious misgivings about the UPA regime’s stand towards America and its commitment to a non-aligned foreign policy.

It is not that their worries have disappeared. But they have undoubtedly received a healing touch from Singh who has nothing but praises for the Cuban and the Iranian Presidents — both of whom are locked in a battle of nerves with the Bush administration.