Krishna blames Pillai for Pak face-off

A spat between two UPA heavyweights, the external affairs minister, Mr S.M. Krishna, and the home minister, Mr P. Chidambaram, threatens to hijack the Prime Minister, Dr Manmohan Singh’s Pakistan initiative.

Mr Krishna on Wednesday locked horns with the home ministry over the handling of the recently concluded India-Pakistan foreign ministers’ talks.

A day after the national security adviser, Mr Shivshankar Menon, reiterated the home secretary, Mr G.K. Pillai’s remarks on the Headley-ISI link, Mr Krishna hit back by saying Mr Pillai’s remarks on the eve of the Islamabad talks were “very unfortunate”. He felt Mr Pillai’s remarks presented the Pakistani side with an excuse to wriggle out of the talks. “Mr Pillai could have waited till I came back to issue a statement. Perhaps it would have been wiser if that statement had not been made just on the eve of my visit,” Mr Krishna said here in interviews to PTI and a TV channel.

“Everyone who was privy to whatever was happening in government of India ought to have known that the right kind of atmosphere from India’s side should have been created for the talks to go on in a very normal manner, but unfortunately this episode happened,” he elaborated.

The minister said he had discussed Mr Pillai’s comments with the PM, whom he had briefed upon his return from Islamabad last week. He said he was glad that the home ministry had since announced the appointment of a spokesperson. In recent months, Mr Pillai had been briefing the media but on Tuesday the ministry appointed additional secretary (Naxal management) D.R.S. Choudhry “official spokesperson”.

Speculation is rife that the gag order was put on Mr Pillai under instruction from the Prime Minister’s Office (PMO). However, PMO sources refused to speak on the issue. The PMO is understood to have sought an explanation from Mr Pillai on the day his remarks were published in an English daily. That was also the day the Krishna-Qureshi talks were being held in Islamabad.

Mr Krishna criticised the Pakistan minister’s abrasive style in his interaction with the media. "I think we can put forward any contention that a country can face in a most forceful way but there has to be dignity, there has to be civility, and civility is certainly no weakness," he asserted.However, Mr Krishna said he was "quite satisfied" with his Pakistan visit as it was a confidence-building exercise and "to that extent, we have succeeded".

Responding to a question on the BJP’s stand that India should not talk to Pakistan now, he said he had briefed the BJP leaders before his visit to Islamabad and conveyed the desirability of engaging Pakistan. "There is no alternative. If somebody can come out with an alternative, I can consider that," Mr Krishna noted.

On Tuesday, Mr Brajesh Mishra, a former national security adviser in the erstwhile BJP-led NDA government, had said the UPA government had made a "serious mistake" by talking to Pakistan and that the recently concluded talks were "bound to fail" as there were elements in India and Pakistan who were not particularly happy with the way the
talks had been arranged.