UPA should be given credit for ending India's nuclear isolation, said Mr Khurshid.
The Narendra Modi-led government should have kept the Opposition in the loop over its talks on the India-US civil nuclear agreement, feels senior Congress leader Salman Khurshid.
Within hours of US President Barack Obama's arrival in Delhi on Sunday morning, a landmark breakthrough on nuclear trade was clinched with Prime Minister Narendra Modi.
It would have been better if the government had "consulted and kept the Opposition in loop" before reaching a "breakthrough understanding", said Mr Khurshid, who was the External Affairs Minister in the UPA government.
"I am not sure yet what the content is. It should be shared with our leadership, Soniaji and Dr Manmohan Singh," Mr Khurshid told NDTV.
Earlier, in the evening, India and the United States had announced that two countries had resolved the issue of liability on suppliers in the case of an accident. As per the agreement, India would set up an insurance pool to indemnify companies who build reactors in the country.
Asked to comment on how much of the breakthrough was a result of the personal chemistry between Prime Minister Modi and President Obama, Khurshid said: "Diplomacy is a lot more than body language. Body language can also be a matter of command performance. We are interested in content and substance and not in stage performances. As long as the performances look good, who can complain?"
In fact, Mr Khurshid made it clear that the UPA should be given credit for ending India's nuclear isolation and criticised the BJP's role in the Opposition.
"If they are following the path that we have set out for them, we can't complain. Who made the nuclear law and under what pressure? The agreement almost brought down the (then UPA) government and the trust vote (held in Parliament over the deal) was forced by the BJP," said Mr Khurshid, adding, "We do deserve an acknowledgment that there was an attempt at interference or else we could have achieved this breakthrough long ago."