| Coming out of the meeting, Defence Minister Pranab Mukherjee said: "Cabinet was not taken into confidence on the Iran vote (in the IAEA). It was not possible." |
| Cabinet ministers later explained that while individual members of the Cabinet Committee on Security (CCS) were telephoned by Foreign Minister K Natwar Singh, before the vote and briefed, it was neither mandatory nor required that Cabinet endorse the way India voted. |
| Given the proportions of the controversy that the United Progressive Alliance (UPA) government had landed itself in, Mukherjee's cryptic remark suggested that there might be some rethinking on the new foreign policy trajectory India was perceived to have set itself on. |
| However, sources in the Prime Minister's Office (PMO) denied that there would be any change in India's stand, or that India would vote differently in November-December, when the next meeting of the IAEA was scheduled. |
| The Left parties have warned the government against violating the common minimum programme by allowing the US hegemonism and threatened of a stir if India did not reverse its stand before the next IAEA meeting. |
| CPI(M) General Secretary Prakash Karat has blamed Prime Minister Manmohan Singh "directly" for the vote. |
| In a clarification yesterday, the government denied reports that the foreign minister was not kept in the loop before the voting decision. But Mukherjee's throwaway remark has served to strengthen the impression that the government was looking for a scapegoat to pin the blame for the entire episode. This is unlikely to be the end of the Iran story. |
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