New foreign minister stirs war of words over Kashmir
Natwar Singh wastes no time in raising Pakistan's hackles over disputed area
Hardly has the new Congress-led coalition government taken over in New Delhi than the war of words between India and Pakistan has begun.
At the centre of the revived tensions is India's new Foreign Minister Natwar Singh, a loquacious and haughty former career diplomat who has made Islamabad edgy by suggesting the framework of the India-Pakistan dialogue, especially involving rival claims to Kashmir, be recast.
Mr Singh advised Pakistan to follow China's example of not allowing its contentious territorial dispute with India to hold back continuing dramatic improvements in economic relations. 'We are saying don't forget Kashmir, but keep it aside for faster progress on other issues,' he said.
He also raised Islamabad's hackles by insisting future negotiations be based on a 1971 agreement under which Pakistan, humiliated by India in the Bangladesh war, implicitly accepted the provisional boundary dividing the two sides in Kashmir.
It is unclear yet how far Mr Singh, 73, who is widely believed to have got his present job because of his closeness to Congress leader Sonia Gandhi, will have a free hand in shaping the new government's policy towards Pakistan.
Until his sudden elevation, Mr Singh, a princeling from Rajasthan who was critical of the pro-United States tilt under the previous Hindu nationalist government, was largely dismissed and described by at least one analyst as 'a bombastic fossil'. He headed Congress' foreign policy cell, with another retired diplomat, Jyotindra Nath Dixit, as his deputy. Both have served as envoys to Islamabad.
Mr Dixit, 68, who has a reputation for being shrewd, intelligent and hawkish, has been appointed National Security Adviser to Prime Minister Manmohan Singh.
Under the previous regime, India's Pakistan strategy was worked out almost exclusively by prime minister Atal Behari Vajpayee and his close aide Brajesh Mishra, with the Foreign Office playing a peripheral role.
New leader Manmohan Singh is an economist with no experience of foreign affairs, so his foreign minister and national security adviser will likely play significant roles in devising India's foreign policy.
'But backstage, Mrs Gandhi will also have a say,' said Mohan Guruswamy, of the New Delhi-based think-tank Centre for Policy Alternatives. 'Ultimately, the policy will be fashioned not so much by past postures but by today's world of real politik, in which the US plays a dominant role.'
But there is no denying the nervousness in Islamabad about having to deal with a new set of players in New Delhi.
President Pervez Musharraf has been quick to invite Mrs Gandhi for a visit, and the irrepressible Natwar Singh has declared in advance that the people of Pakistan would give her a rousing reception.
Meanwhile, Islamabad has made it clear that the Sino-Indian model cannot apply to India-Pakistan relations.
'Kashmir is not a border issue, it's not about empty spaces,' Foreign Ministry spokesman Masood Khan said, responding to Mr Singh's advice.
