US n-firms feel the New Delhi chill

New Delhi: A US nuclear trade mission of around 50 companies, currently doing the rounds in the Indian capital and dropping loud hints of sourcing nuclear engineering products from India, may be feeling the New Delhi chill a bit more harsher than others. With NPT zealots in the Obama administration ensuring that the 123 Agreement takes its time to materialise, New Delhi may have atlast decided to shed some of its forced cordiality to all things American and not rollout the red carpet.

Ostensibly, the delegation has made the trip to try and understand the ''policy challenges'' that stand between them and the Indian market. This would have involved meeting officials in the Prime Minister's Office (PMO) and assorted ministers in the central government.

An Indian administration that has seen all the bonhomie between the respective governments gradually wither away, even as NPT-hawks and assorted cold war-era warriors begin to assert greater authority within the policy making confines of the US administration, may have decided to splash some cold water on the hype that Americans routinely generate with all their endeavours.

In this case, even as India was signing a path-breaking civil nuclear agreement with Russia, the American companies were painting rainbows in the sky as to how they would outsource a lot of nuclear engineering products from India once they had the contracts in their pockets.

So far, the American delegation has yet to receive appointments with any meaningful entity, either in the prime minister's office or elsewhere in the government. The ostensible reason being trotted out is that the delegation is composed of members who are too 'junior' to be received at higher levels of the government.

It is also being given to understand that the American companies may have landed in New Delhi without the permission of their own government.