One of the top priorities the Manmohan Singh government has set itself is to raise India's global profile and gain more influence in the international arena. But the last few weeks have witnessed three setbacks to this effort. Ironically, this has happened just as a new Foreign Secretary, Shivshankar Menon, has taken charge. An exceptionally capable officer, Menon surely deserved a better start.

What are the setbacks? First, the India-United States nuclear deal hit a major roadblock last weekend, with the Senate going into a recess without passing an empowering bill.

Second, India squandered precious opportunities to take leadership positions in forums like Non-Aligned Movement, and the Group of 77, comprising the world's developing countries.

Third, Shashi Tharoor withdrew his candidature from the race for the next Secretary General of the United Nations after it became apparent that one of the permanent members of the Security Council (P-5) would veto his appointment.

The US Senate will probably take up the Bill when it reconvenes in what's called a "lame duck" session after the November 7 elections to the entire House of Representatives and one-third of the Senate. (It's called "lame duck" because its old chamber survives until the new one meets. But the old Senate includes some members who may have lost the elections, but still have the right to vote. Normally, no major business is conducted during such sessions.)

But there is some uncertainly. If the Democrats do well in the elections, as expected, they may not give the India Bill top priority. Some Democrats are evidently reluctant to give unconditional passage to it even as it stands, containing several clauses India finds unpalatable.

Last week, the Democrats moved as many as 19 amendments to the Senate Bill. (The House has already passed a similar but less restrictive Bill.)

If the Bill's passage is delayed, the whole process will have to be re-started from scratch in 2007 in both chambers. A Congress with a stronger Democratic complexion might impose further conditions upon India for permitting resumption of civilian nuclear commerce. 2007 will be President Bush's "lame duck" year too. The nuclear deal has now entered the thicket of US domestic politics, which can be arcane and parochial.

The Indian government, admittedly, isn't responsible for this. But its lobbying effort seems to have been relatively light with the Democrats; it concentrated excessively on the Republicans. But generally, the lobbying wasn't weak. Besides two PR firms, New Delhi has been working closely with the American Jewish Congress, despite its deplorable Zionist credentials.

If the final Congressional outcome is significantly different from the July 2005 and March 2006 Bush-Singh agreements, India will find it hard to accept it. Already, its nuclear lobby is grumbling about the exclusion in the Senate Bill of technologies/materials pertaining to spent-fuel reprocessing, uranium enrichment and heavy water production from the scope of bilateral cooperation.

Besides, there's the political Opposition, which demands that the original goalposts shouldn't be shifted.

India committed a major blunder last month when it declined the chairpersonship of NAM, a movement it co-founded. The chair went to Egypt. This wasn't innocuous. India has been under pressure from Washington to reduce its role in forums like NAM, which the US regards as "anti-American".

India helped dilute some NAM resolutions which sharply criticised Western hegemonism. This was in keeping with a public statement from Washington that it expects "friends" like India and Indonesia to help it at Havana.

Similarly, India rejected the chairmanship of the G-77, a grouping which it had helped create. The G-77 has 134 members today, more than NAM's 118. The chair has gone to Pakistan. This would have been a diplomatic victory had India and Pakistan jointly agreed to the arrangement. In the event, it became India's loss.

This too seems related to the illusion, entertained by some in the Foreign Office, that India is now in the Big League, a class apart from groups representing the Global South.

As for Tharoor's United Nations bid, it was a mistake for India to have supported it in the first place. Although an Indian national, Tharoor had no particular credentials as an Indian or Southern candidate, nor a history of progressive positions favouring reform of the UN system. Tharoor has been essentially a PR man for Kofi Annan.

India backed his candidature — declared as a purely individual decision — without consultations with its own UN mission and any of the P-5. India's support for Tharoor worked against her own ambitious bid to become a permanent member of the Security Council. By convention, the SG is not a national of a permanent member-state.

India ignored the US' hints that it would favour a candidate from East Asia, and that it didn't want another UN "insider" (Annan was one) as Secretary General. Even Russia didn't publicly support Tharoor-despite Manmohan Singh's reported request at the St Petersburg G-8 summit. The US and China worked behind the scenes to find an alternative candidate.

Ultimately, the negative vote that Tharoor got in the last straw poll, on Monday, was none other than the US's. Clearly the ‘strategic partnership' has pretty severe limitations! India would be profoundly mistaken to imagine that Washington would allow its priorities and preferences to be influenced by India.

It is India that will have to trim its sails to accommodate the US in any partnership — not the other way around. And that will inevitably mean that India compromises or abandons its own independent policies and interests.

This setback isn't trivial. In 1996 too, India adopted an ambitious posture by contesting a non-permanent Security Council seat against Japan. It lost badly-by 40 to 142 votes. It took India years to recover.

Clearly, a course correction has become necessary. India must reorient its priorities by giving up its obsession with the US. Its natural place lies in South — not in an unequal "strategic partnership" with the world's sole, and arrogant, superpower.

First published by The Khaleej Times. Copyright 2006 Khaleej Times