GANDHINAGAR: Former External Affairs Minister and Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) leader Atal Bihari Vajpayee lashed out at the US for attempting to pressurize India into following its path of economic development.

Addressing the party National Council meeting here he said “Maybe their path is good for us, but the right to decide is solely ours and we should brook no interference from any quarters in this regard.

Vajpayee pointed out that Communism had met with an ignominious end the world over and the USSR had disappeared and now America was talking in terms of a new order-one made to its order, However, capitalism, which it symbolized, was also facing a serious economic crisis. India could therefore not afford to blindly emulate any model, he added.

The former External Affairs Minister stressed the need for involving a model of our own which followed a central path ideally suited to India needs and conditions.

This search for a model of development best suited to us had begun in right earnest after Independence, but the Nehruvian model failed because it was overpowered by the Soviet model, Unfortunately we came up with a system which had the worst of both the Communist and the capitalist models and are now saddled with a structure that is cracking up.”

Vajpayee described his party’s economic document, which has been passed at the Gandhi nagar National Council meeting, as the first effort in the attempt to come up with a whole Indian economic concept.

It is precisely with this in mind that we have laid stress on the Gandhi a principle of Swadeshi. With a large mass of people still below the poverty line, it is not only increased production and scientific growth but discipline in consumption and a self-initiated curb on consumerism that is the need of the hour,” the BJP leader said.

Vajpayee criticized the attempts by America to make India sign the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty. “Neither will we agree to this nor will we ever allow the Government to sign it.”

He however, said there was only one condition under which his party would agree to the country signing the treaty and that was after it also developed nuclear weapon systems.

It cannot be that while Pakistan possesses nuclear capability, India should sign any such treaty pointed out.

Article extracted from this publication >> May 15, 1992