As the main Opposition party, the Congress has been playing an important role in foreign policy matters, including the CTBT issue. On Monday, Natwar Singh, head of the Congress foreign affairs department, put forth two new reasons for India not signing the treaty by September.

Singh said that the status of the government was that of a ``caretaker'' which meant it had no locus standi to sign the treaty. ``In any case, we are going to polls at that time so the question doesn't arise,'' he added. Clearly, the Congress would like the issue to be left to the new government which is likely to be in office by early October.

Singh also said there was no national consensus on the CTBT issue as yet and the Vajpayee government had not called any meetingwith Opposition parties to discuss the matter. The Congress has been stressing on consensus governing India's foreign policy decisions and would like a uniform line to emerge after deliberations between all parties.

The Congress added that since China, US and Russia have so far not ratified the treaty, India and Pakistan should evolve a ``common approach'' to the issue in lieu of their status as nuclear powers. ``We are both nuclear powers now and it would be better if we have our own common approach to the matter,'' Singh said.

The Congress felt that details of the talks between External Affairs Minister Jaswant Singh and US Deputy Secretary of State Strobe Talbott on the CTBT issue should be known as ``it cannot be a private enterprise of two people.''

India must sign the treaty only if it is ``fully satisfied'' that its vital national interests were protected, Singh said. In effect, the Congress line raises doubts on whether the September deadline of ratifying the CTBT treaty will be met. There arealso doubts on the fallout of not meeting the deadline, especially regarding India's relations with the US.

On Sunday too, the Congress took an anti-US line when it condemned NATO's bombing of the Chinese Embassy in Belgrade thus becoming the first political party to react in such fashion in the country. On Monday, two Left parties took a similar line saying the government must be tough on the issue of the Chinese Embassy's bombing.