Saturday, December 24 2005 13:11 Hrs (IST) - World Time -

New Delhi: India today (Dec 24, 2005) said it was hopeful that many of the contentious issues on the nuclear deal with the US would be resolved before President George W Bush's visit here early March and an agreement in principle firmed up on its implementation.

New Delhi is also expecting Foreign Secretary Shyam Saran, who held talks with his American interlocutors in Washington, to bring a draft legislation, which the US will present to the Congress for its approval of the July 18 understanding reached between Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and Bush.

"If both sides are reasonably satisfied with this as also certain changes and guidelines of Nuclear Suppliers Group, it is possible to move forward," National Security Adviser M K Narayanan told NDTV.

During Singh's visit to Washington in July, the US had implicitly recognised India as a nuclear weapon state and agreed to supply fuel for Tarapore reactors following a series of commitments by India, including that of separating civilian and military facilities.

The understanding had signaled a major gain for India, which has been having difficulties getting external supply of nuclear fuel ever since the 1998 Pokhran nuclear tests.

Asked whether India saw the US legislation coming through before the arrival here of Bush, Narayanan candidly said, "No, I don't think it will happen before President Bush comes to India".

"Observing that there was a Congressional recess coming up, Narayanan said "we are hopeful that by the time President Bush comes, he can have something like an in principle agreement i.e. many of the contentious issues on either side have been ironed out," he said.

This will be one of the 'main deliverables' the two sides can reach when he arrives "Which we hope will be in early March," he said.

"The safeguard that applies to the civilian sector of the strategic programme would be completed based on it, "Narayanan said.

Asked about Pakistan President Pervez Musharraf's proposal of demilitarization of parts of Jammu and Kashmir, he ruled it out saying there were 'difficulties'.

"It (demilitarization) is generally perceived the world over as a sovereign right," he said contending this could be considered when such areas were completely free of violence.

Emphasizing that it would be 'extremely difficult' to talk about demilitarization, he said reduction of forces wherever necessary was an issue which the back channels could first iron out and then it could be taken through the composite dialogue.

On Pakistan's suggestion of self-governance for J and K, he said nobody was quite clear on what they wanted. If it included higher level of autonomy, then there was no problem, but if meant something else, no one has spelt it out.

"We have a back channel. We have experienced diplomats as part of it and if they (Pakistan) come forward and give specifics about self-governance, then we can probably look at it," Narayanan said.