angeldemon_007
SENIOR MEMBER
- Joined
- Nov 29, 2010
- Messages
- 5,298
- Reaction score
- 0
For months, the Prime Minister, Dr Manmohan Singh, was batting on the back foot. Now, when the budget session, with all the cynicism generated by the Opposition attack on scams, is behind him, Dr Manmohan Singh has apparently decided to open out and take major initiatives on the policy front.
Some indications that he can no longer just watch the Opposition go on attacking his government was available towards the end of the session when he took on L K Advani and impressed on him the virtues of patience, telling him that he will have to wait for three-and-a-half years more if he thought the Prime Ministership was his birth right. His strong defence of the Government in WikiLeak reports in both Houses did raise the morale of the Congress party.
On Friday night, he came out with an unexpected move. This was through two identical letters he wrote and sent to Islamabad - one to President Asif Ali Zardari and the other to Prime Minister Yousuf Raza Gilani - inviting them to join him to watch the India-Pakistan world cup semi-final at Mohali on Wednesday.
It is no mean initiative by the Prime Minister, who has been having peace with Pakistan on his mind. It changes the agenda before the nation, which has lately been caught in a running debate on all assortments of scams of different kinds.
While 26/11 cruelly disrupted the Indo-Pak dialogue for over two years, the Mohali initiative may mark the initiation of a new dialogue on a somewhat hopeful note.
Where terrorists have failed to suppress the desire for peace among people in both countries, it seems cricket can make a creative contribution towards Indo-Pak diplomacy.
It is not known whether both the President and the Prime Minister of Pakistan will be visiting Mohali. There is the possibility of only Prime Minister Gilani joining the bat-and-ball game at Mohali.
Not that the two Prime Ministers will straight away get to resolving long- outstanding problems. The Mohali rendezvous can give a signal to their senior officials that they should start moving towards tackling most of outstanding issues that have kept the two countries apart for nearly 64 years.
The two governments have, however, chosen not to raise the expectations of the people and the world too high, in view of the history of ups and down the previous peace- making exercises have experienced.
The idea this time seems to be to do what is do-able and start nibbling at the other problems that are seriously intractable. The issues that have kept the two countries apart are terrorism, Kashmir, Siachen, Sir Creek and Wullar Barrage etc.
Those who know how summit-level diplomacy is conducted feel that some contacts must have taken place before the two Prime Ministers chose to meet even while watching cricket at Mohali-ostensibly. The letters to President Zardari and Prime Minister Gilani are identical in content and exude something more than just the spirit of cricket of the two countries.
The two foreign secretaries, Mrs. Nirupama Rao and Mr. Salman Bashir, met at Thimpu to carry forward talks at their level and prepared the ground for future contacts. They have been talking to each other also on the telephone to see that moves towards dialogue are made on sure ground.
Why the cricket match at Mohali has been chosen to signal a soft launch of the resumption of the dialogue is mainly to see that expectations do not run too high, only to be belied later.
How far the two countries will travel and how much ground they will be able to cover remains to be seen, considering the fate of the previous peace-making efforts. By H K Dua.
Peace Dialogue - PM bats on front foot (Article)
Some indications that he can no longer just watch the Opposition go on attacking his government was available towards the end of the session when he took on L K Advani and impressed on him the virtues of patience, telling him that he will have to wait for three-and-a-half years more if he thought the Prime Ministership was his birth right. His strong defence of the Government in WikiLeak reports in both Houses did raise the morale of the Congress party.
On Friday night, he came out with an unexpected move. This was through two identical letters he wrote and sent to Islamabad - one to President Asif Ali Zardari and the other to Prime Minister Yousuf Raza Gilani - inviting them to join him to watch the India-Pakistan world cup semi-final at Mohali on Wednesday.
It is no mean initiative by the Prime Minister, who has been having peace with Pakistan on his mind. It changes the agenda before the nation, which has lately been caught in a running debate on all assortments of scams of different kinds.
While 26/11 cruelly disrupted the Indo-Pak dialogue for over two years, the Mohali initiative may mark the initiation of a new dialogue on a somewhat hopeful note.
Where terrorists have failed to suppress the desire for peace among people in both countries, it seems cricket can make a creative contribution towards Indo-Pak diplomacy.
It is not known whether both the President and the Prime Minister of Pakistan will be visiting Mohali. There is the possibility of only Prime Minister Gilani joining the bat-and-ball game at Mohali.
Not that the two Prime Ministers will straight away get to resolving long- outstanding problems. The Mohali rendezvous can give a signal to their senior officials that they should start moving towards tackling most of outstanding issues that have kept the two countries apart for nearly 64 years.
The two governments have, however, chosen not to raise the expectations of the people and the world too high, in view of the history of ups and down the previous peace- making exercises have experienced.
The idea this time seems to be to do what is do-able and start nibbling at the other problems that are seriously intractable. The issues that have kept the two countries apart are terrorism, Kashmir, Siachen, Sir Creek and Wullar Barrage etc.
Those who know how summit-level diplomacy is conducted feel that some contacts must have taken place before the two Prime Ministers chose to meet even while watching cricket at Mohali-ostensibly. The letters to President Zardari and Prime Minister Gilani are identical in content and exude something more than just the spirit of cricket of the two countries.
The two foreign secretaries, Mrs. Nirupama Rao and Mr. Salman Bashir, met at Thimpu to carry forward talks at their level and prepared the ground for future contacts. They have been talking to each other also on the telephone to see that moves towards dialogue are made on sure ground.
Why the cricket match at Mohali has been chosen to signal a soft launch of the resumption of the dialogue is mainly to see that expectations do not run too high, only to be belied later.
How far the two countries will travel and how much ground they will be able to cover remains to be seen, considering the fate of the previous peace-making efforts. By H K Dua.
Peace Dialogue - PM bats on front foot (Article)
kidding
