India's government announced that the vote of confidence will take place on July 22. A two-day special session of parliament will be called on July 21. "This decision has been communicated to the president of India," Viyalar Ravi, the minister for parliamentary affairs, told reporters after a cabinet meeting late on Friday. A regional party has stepped in to replace Communists who opposed the nuclear deal, but Prime Minister Manmohan Singh's government still needs the support of smaller parties and independent lawmakers to survive the confidence vote. The government will fall if it loses the vote, triggering early elections and damaging chances of the deal. The nuclear deal would be a landmark for India's relations with the West and allow India access to US civilian nuclear fuel and technology, despite not signing the Non-Proliferation Treaty and conducting nuclear tests in 1974 and 1998. Trying to cobble a majority, government allies met on Friday with potential supporting parties, many of whom are keen to avoid polls at a time when inflation is at a record high. "I have no doubt that we shall prove our majority," Sonia Gandhi, the ruling Congress party head and India's most powerful politician, was quoted as saying by the Press Trust of India. The government's worries have been compounded by vacillation among some long-standing partners, worried the pact with the United States may alienate voters before elections next year. The balance of power is held by the regional Samajwadi Party which said its 39 lawmakers would back the government. But it needs another seven votes from smaller parties for a majority. "I think the government will survive the confidence vote, perhaps with around a 10-vote margin," said analyst Kuldip Nayar. Barack Obama, the presumptive US Democratic presidential candidate, said he supported the deal, according to the transcript of an interview with an Indian news magazine. "The existing agreement effectively balanced a range of important issues, from our strategic relationship with India to our non-proliferation concerns to India's energy needs," he told Outlook, which will publish the interview on Saturday. J&K under federal rule India's Jammu & Kashmir state was put under federal rule Friday following the collapse of the state government over a land row that prompted more than a week of rioting in the Muslim region, officials said. Kashmir state's governor, N.N. Vohra, "issued a proclamation on Thursday evening and assumed, with immediate effect, all the functions of the government of the state," an official statement said. It is the third time the scenic Himalayan region will be directly ruled by New Delhi since an Islamic insurgency, which has left at least 43,000 people dead, broke out 18 years ago.
