Making it amply clear that the 123 agreement would be a major plank for Congress in the coming elections, party general secretary Rahul Gandhi on Wednesday hard sold nuclear energy as the vehicle to transform India into a superpower.

Speaking at a party spokesmen's meet, the Amethi MP took an aggressive stand dismissing the opponents to the nuke deal as short-sighted politicians scared of new technology and incapable of looking ahead.

"The agreement is in national interest, so we have to move with courage," he said. In an indirect reference to the Left, he said that those who had opposed computers in the 1980s could not anticipate the huge resources and thousands of jobs generated by the IT sector.

"India today is a moderately powerful country, we have to be a superpower," he said and pointed out that nuclear energy could make that happen. Rejecting the argument that the deal would subject Indian reactors to outside inspection, he said that six reactors were already under such supervision.

Rahul termed conventional energy as an option for the rich and projected nuclear power as an agent of change for the poor. "When I talked of Kalawati, I saw her as a symbol of deprivation and backwardness; there are millions of Kalawatis in this country — to change their life we need power," he said.

Dubbing the anti-deal propaganda as fear psychosis, he said there was an urgent need to come out of the sense of insecurity. "We have to face this phobia and conquer it," he said.

Replying to questions from the audience, the first-term MP discounted the possibility of the US changing its attitude to the nuclear agreement with India in the event of a Democratic win in the presidential election.