As the India-US nuclear deal enters the crucial reconciliation phase in the US Congress, New Delhi’s message to Washington is clear that both sides agreed to a permanent deal and nothing in the final version should bring this permanence into question.

Hoping that its concerns will be addressed at the Conference where a single Bill will drawn up for a final up-and-down vote in both chambers of the Congress, the Manmohan Singh government is also beginning to realise that the final version may still have irritants and it must be prepared for another round of challenging domestic political management on the issue.

But before that, all efforts are on to get a final version ‘‘as close as possible’’ to the July 18 understanding. The broad sense of India’s concerns is that nothing in the Bill should affect the permanence of the deal. That the sequencing of other steps should not affect the reciprocity built into the July 18 understanding, there should be no India-specific restriction and that the assurance on fuel supplies will not be diluted by the law. So for India, the broad agenda for the Conference will mean provisions falling in any of these categories must be removed.

Permanence of the n-deal:

• This relates to provisions that give out conditions under which the cooperation can be terminated.

• House version says exports can be terminated if India makes any “materially significant” transfer that violates NSG and MTCR guidelines. Now, there are many private entities which get reported for such violations. India feels a statutory obligation would place the deal under constant threat.

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