Tuesday, February 14 2006 17:20 Hrs (IST) - World Time -

New Delhi: The main Opposition BJP today (Feb 14,2006) opposed the Left's proposed country-wide protests against US President George Bush's visit upcoming visit but expressed fears that through the Indo-US nuclear deal being negotiated may cap the country's capability of fissile material production.

"We welcome the visit of President Bush to India early next month and expect of the Government to avail of this opportunity to put India-US relations back on a balanced, and an equal and even keel", said a statement after a meeting of the BJP Parliamentary Party executive, chaired by former Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee.

Accusing the UPA Government of not keeping the country full informed about the July 18 nuclear deal, the statement said, "It is of paramount importance that India takes no such step as would deny it the needed flexibility of maintaining a minimum credible deterrent enshrined as a policy postulate in India's nuclear doctrine".

"Today, unfortunately all indications from Washington lead to the conclusion that through the nuclear deal, India will have to cap its capability of fissile material production," it said.

"What is at stake here are national security issues, autonomy of India's decision making processes, autonomy and independence of our nuclear programmes, the inviolability of the principles of a minimum credible deterrent, where decisions about numbers, size and contents are a sovereign national function not a result of any bilateral agreement; plus, the future of our scientific and technological research in the nuclear field", it said.