June 4th 2004
Officially, Defence Minister Pranab Mukherjee would not be attending the Asian Defence Ministers’ meet at Singapore, also called as the Shangri La dialogue, due to his pre-occupation with the first Parliament session under the new government.
However, what has emerged is that Mr Mukherjee is skipping the meet, where Defence Ministers from 20 Asian countries and from the major Western powers, including the USA, would be participating as New Delhi is seeking to have just a “structured dialogue” with Washington rather than informal meetings.
Mr Mukherjee would have been heading the Indian delegation at the Singapore meet starting tomorrow and there was a possibility of him meeting the US Defence Secretary Donald Rumsfeld on its sidelines. Mr Rumsfeld is due to deliver the keynote address at the meet where he would also outline the Washington’s security strategy for the region and its plans for Iraq.
The Indian delegation would now be led by Defence Secretary Ajay Prasad. The issue of India and the USA holding this first ‘minister level unofficial meet’ was also said to have been discussed at the highest level in the government and the conclusion was to skip it.
The issue of Mr Mukherjee meeting Mr Rumsfeld also apparently came during the discussions which the US Under Secretary for Defence Douglas Feith had with the Indian Defence Minister during his just-concluded visit. Mr Feith was heading the US delegation at the Defence Policy Group (DPG) meeting between the two countries which concluded yesterday.
At the DPG meeting the USA gave a clear indication that it would be waiting for the new dispensation to work out the extent of the finer details of India’s strategic relations with it. Mr Feith had said the USA would be waiting for the new government to assess, “where we are and where we need to move forward”.
Sources in the Ministry of Defence (MoD) said the new government was still working on its stand towards the USA and a meeting between Mr Mukherjee and Mr Rumsfeld in Singapore would have been a premature one. This specially, as the Congress-led UPA government, which has the Left parties as its major supporter, would first like to clarify Washington’s stand on some issues which were important to New Delhi, before moving forward.
Besides, since India and the USA had just concluded an official-level meet, another discussion at the minister level would not have served any purpose, the sources said. The Defence Minister would only have exposed himself to undue pressures from the USA at this meeting without having really reviewed the previous NDA government’s policies towards Washington.
According to the sources, one of the issues that India apparently wants to clarify with the USA is the Washington’s soft stand towards Islamabad. The new government wants to seek answers from the USA as to how Pakistan could be it strategic partner in the region rather than India.
The new government wants to put India at a plane from where it could talk to the USA at equal terms. And for this could even narrow down some passages which had been thrown open by the previous government.
The sources disclosed that there was also an advisory from the Ministry of External Affairs for the minister to skip the visit to Singapore as it was again in favour of India and the USA having just the “structured dialogues” at official meets, rather than unofficial meetings.
