To salvage an important policy, the prime minister allegedly gets tough with his government; then goes weak againIN FOUR years as India's prime minister, Manmohan Singh has come to resemble a bearded and turbaned Aunt Sally. A more quarrelsome government than his would be hard to recreate: it comprises his centrist Congress party and a dozen small leftist and regional outfits, and relies for a parliamentary majority on the "outside" support of India's Communist parties. And Mr Singh has little control over this mutinous mix; his party boss, Sonia Gandhi, the Italian-born widow of a murdered Congress leader, runs the show. This arrangement has assured Mr Singh many brickbats, and little freedom to dodge.But ahead of the latest volley--at "crisis" talks between the government and Communists on June 25th--Mr Singh allegedly threatened to up his stake and quit. At the least, he appears to have lobbied Mrs Gandhi hard on behalf of a controversial policy that caused the crisis: a civil-nuclear co-operation agreement with America, forged by Mr Singh and President George Bush in 2005. This pact, which still needs approval from other countries involved in nuclear issues and a final sign-off by America's Congress, would provide energy-starved India with nuclear fuel and technology that it badly needs, without forcing it to submit to the strictures of the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT). An unprecedented recognition of India's nucl ...
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