A few days ago, the External Affairs Minister told the left parties that the Indo-US civil nuclear deal is a privileged document and that it cannot be shared with them. In fact, the Government had circulated a summary of the Safeguards agreement to the members of the UPA-Left coordination committee. The External Affairs minister went on record saying that if the left intended to go through the 'draft', they would have to become part of the Government. Soon came a rejoinder from the IAEA that there was no such condition in the Agency's dealings.

This bloomer was obviously because of total non application of mind and an avoidable over emphasis on information security. The question is, in such a matter of grave national importance, does the Government have the right of confidentiality. More often than not, confidentiality is no virtue. Secrecy, privacy or the privilege of non disclosure are powers vested with the Government for very rare use. In a democracy, this power should seldom be used.

It didn't end here. Pranab Mukherjee had announced on Tuesday that the government would send India's safeguards agreement to the IAEA Board for approval only if it won the trust vote in Parliament. Mr. Mukherjee also stated that he had consulted the Prime Minister who was in Japan. Less than 24 hours of this statement, the IAEA announced that at the request of the Government of India, the text has been submitted to the Board for its consideration. Thus, a solemn commitment to the nation was broken.

All this bungling was certainly avoidable.