Rahul Gandhi

New Delhi, June 25: Working quietly behind the babble of uncertain Congress voices on the nuclear deal, party general secretary Rahul Gandhi is believed to have tugged opinion in favour of going ahead with it.

Rahul’s pro-deal views are well known and stated but reliable sources close to the young Gandhi indicated today that he may have re-emphasised them pointedly in the run-up to the latest round of brinkmanship with the Left.

“He is 200 per cent for the deal and he has been speaking his mind at all forums,” a source close to him said. “He clearly can’t be counted among the ditherers in the party.”

Although there is nothing to indicate Rahul has overtly pushed the Prime Minister’s case in order to rid the Congress of its prevarication — Manmohan Singh is known to be increasingly upset with his party’s inability to stand up for the deal despite unanimous resolutions of the government and the Congress backing it — it is learnt that he has been arguing actively for it in “influential circles”, which may be nothing more than a euphemism for his mother and Congress president, Sonia Gandhi.

It is only too well known that Sonia often relies on close family — Rahul, Priyanka and son-in-law Robert Vadra — to firm up critical decisions.

The protracted row over the nuclear deal has pitched the UPA chairperson on the horns of a bitter dilemma: on the one side, a trusted and indispensable Prime Minister bent on pushing the deal, and, on the other, the combined prospect of a bitter break with the Left and facing polls in an economically adverse climate.

There is a section of the Congress which has been counselling against risking early elections, especially at a time when inflation is soaring at a record recent high. HRD minister Arjun Singh is believed to be among the senior partymen pegging this view.

Arjun is learnt to have met Sonia last week and advised her against pushing the nuclear deal at the cost of having to go for early polls — do that and you will risk the wrath of an electorate agonising under the price burden.

On the contrary, the Prime Minister believes that facing general elections a few months earlier than scheduled cannot be allowed to weigh on an “epochal agreement” that, at least on paper, has the unanimous approval of the cabinet, the Congress Working Committee and the ruling UPA.

In any event, the Prime Minister’s camp has been arguing with growing impatience that a later poll is no insurance on a better price situation and the Left has to be electorally battled anyhow.

As the international time-table on completing formalities for the deal runs out --- and the prospect of having to face President George W. Bush at the G8 Summit in Japan empty handed loomed --- the Prime Minister is believed to have sent signals to his party leadership that he needed a “clear resolution” well in advance of his departure for Japan on July 7.

Nobody in authority has confirmed this but Manmohan Singh is learnt to have indicated that he would be forced to opt out of the G8 Summit if the UPA gave in to the Left.

The political air in New Delhi has, indeed, swarmed with all manner of speculation --- wild and unattested --- these past days. Some interpreted the Prime Minister’s decision to cancel appointments as a “sulk”; the truth is, he was down with a post-operative viral following a cataract procedure last week.

Another rumour had it that he had extended his sulk and had “stopped signing files”. An aide heartily laughed that one off, but said: “The Prime Minister is not a man given to histrionics but that is not to say he cannot stick firm on matters close to him. The Indo-US nuclear deal certainly is and he is understandably upset that he is having to lobby with his own party on something that has the ruling coalition’s unanimous seal of approval.”

The aide stressed yet again that it wasn’t a matter of the Prime Minister’s “personal prestige” alone, India’s “international credibility” was tied to the deal.

“Elections are going to happen in a few months anyway, is it fair to sacrifice something that both the Congress and UPA think is good for the country, and stake our credibility, just to have a few more months in power?”

Rahul, who has been positioned by the Congress to play a key role in the next elections, is learnt to be of similar thinking. Sources said that Rahul “shares” the Prime Minister’s “broader worldview and policy framework” and is not inclined to see the government going back on an international commitment of “immense current and future import”.

In the words of one close adviser, Rahul believes that the nuclear deal is “not a matter limited to the shape and future of Indo-US relations, it is about India’s standing in the world”.