'Indo-US nuclear deal will improve ties'

The US Congress gave final approval on Saturday to legislation allowing the export of civilian nuclear fuel and technology to India for the first time in the more than 30 years since the Asian country first tested a nuclear device.

"This is a quantum leap in Indo-American relations and a quantum leap in how India is viewed among the larger powers," said analyst Prashant Dikshit, deputy director of the New Delhi-based Institute for Peace and Conflict Studies.

"This will open doors for the Nuclear Suppliers' Group and new relations with an emerging weaponised India."

Under the controversial deal, India, a non-signatory to the nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT), agreed to place its civilian-use atomic reactors under global scrutiny.

The deal still required the endorsement of the influential 45-nation Nuclear Suppliers Group (NSG).

"This is a first step to ending the international isolation that India had faced on the nuclear front," Indian former career diplomat G. Parthasarathy told AFP.

"We'll have a clear picture about what form the end of nuclear sanctions will take only when the NSG agrees."

The United States and India will now have to frame a comprehensive agreement incorporating all technical elements of the deal and it has to be passed by the US Congress again.

A group representing Indian industry said Saturday the deal underscored the ever-closer ties between India and the United States, which sat on opposite sides of the fence during the Cold War.

"Apart from fueling India's nuclear energy program, the agreement is a powerful expression of the importance the US attaches to India," said Saroj K. Poddar, head of the Federation of Indian Chambers of Commerce and Industry.