The Congress on Monday emphasised once again that the United Progressive Alliance was not scrapping the India-United States nuclear agreement right now and said that it was making efforts to allay the apprehensions of the Left allies over the agreement.

"There is no backing off right now," said All India Congress Committee spokesperson Shakeel Ahmed.

He was responding to questions on whether the Indo-US nuclear deal had been put on hold in view of the opposition to it by the Left allies. "The prime minister and the Congress president have already made their stand clear and the Congress party has nothing to add or delete to what has been said," Ahmed said.

To a query whether the prime minister will call up US President George W Bush [Images] to explain the status of the deal in India, he said it was an internal matter and there was no need for Singh to explain it to any world leader.

"When our supporting parties have some apprehensions, it is our responsibility to sit together and remove those apprehensions," Ahmed said.

He pointed out that had the deal been called off, there would be no need for a meeting of the UPA-Left committee on the nuclear agreement on October 22.

On Tamil Nadu Chief Minister M Karunanidhi's comments that his party played a major role in resolving the nuclear deal stand-off, Ahmed said the DMK chief was entitled to his opinion. "Decisions are taken after discussions with all political parties in the alliance," Ahmed said.