The New Nation - Internet Edition

Reuters, New Delhi

India's government and its communist allies are eyeing ways out of their face-off over a nuclear pact with the United States, but failure to grasp these straws will spark a fresh crisis next month, officials said. Prime Minister Manmohan Singh's coalition faces an informal end-October deadline to start working on the next steps needed to clinch the deal, and if the row with left parties opposed to it is not resolved by then early polls may be called, they said. "There are one or two options being considered. But either way, we have to decide by the end of October," said a government minister. "The Americans want the deal to be approved by their Congress before it goes for its summer break around June."