WRAPUP 2-India ruling party hails historic nuclear deal
* Deal latest step in India shift toward West
* Critics see damage to non-proliferation
* Pact could mean billions for business
* Pakistan eyes similar deal
NEW DELHI, Oct 2 (Reuters) - India's ruling Congress party on Thursday hailed U.S. approval of a historic nuclear trade deal which will unleash billions of dollars of investment and draw the world's biggest democracy closer to the West.
The U.S. Congress voted in favour of the deal ending a three-decade ban on U.S. nuclear trade with India, handing a victory to President George W. Bush on a top foreign policy priority.
"This is unprecedented, its historic," said Abhishek Manu Singhvi, a spokesman for Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh's Congress party. "For the first time a country like India has been given the international acclamation by the entire world at lightning speed."
The communists, who withdrew their support for the Singh government in July over the deal, condemned it as India's "surrender" to Washington.
For India, faced with a massive energy deficit, the accord opens up a market worth billions to U.S. companies such as General Electric (GE.N) and Westinghouse Electric, a unit of Japan's Toshiba Corp (6502.T).
The deal also caps a gradual rapprochement with the West since the days of socialist self-reliance, a process that began with economic reforms in the 1990s and has gathered pace with the spread of wealth and Western culture ever since.
But the pact was always more about geopolitical strategy then business ties. It will bolster India's strategic clout and the alliance will counterbalance China's rise in the region.
"The United States saw that India's economic clout will inevitably translate into strategic power. And the U.S. acted," said C. Raja Mohan, a Singapore-based security expert.
"It's a means to an end, helping clear the way for India and the West to work together. Before the deal, India was not part of the international calculus in Asia. Now it is."
NON-PROLIFERATION DISASTER?
Final approval came late on Wednesday when the Senate voted to ratify the agreement, sending the legislation to Bush to sign into law. Continued...
