Iftikhar Gilani
I remember the heated debate in the Lok Sabha on the afternoon of 28 May 1998, 10 days after India conducted nuclear tests. I was sitting in the front row of the press gallery, right above the Speaker’s chair, covering the debate.
In the morning, Home Minister L K Advani had said that India’s nuclear tests had changed the regional balance of power, a statement aimed at Pakistan. Parliamentary Affairs Minister Madan Lal Khurana provocatively warned Pakistan to choose the time and place to fight India.
At 4 o’clock, Natwar Singh, a Congress MP from Rajasthan, entered the House. A former diplomat, who worked in the Ministry of External Affairs till 1984, Singh had delivered a well-articulated and thoughtful speech that morning.
As he entered the House, he whispered something to the Leader of Opposition Sharad Pawar, and sent a slip to Speaker G M C Bala Yogi.
The atmosphere became visibly tense, indicating that something important was happening outside the House.
I clearly remember Somnath Chatterjee, a prominent leader of the Left, speaking at that moment. Singh indicated to him to give him the floor as he had something very important to say.
Chatterjee gave the floor to Singh, who announced that Pakistan had just conducted nuclear tests. This revelation caused a stir in the House.
Amid the commotion, Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee and Advani walked out of the House, further aggravating tensions.
During this interruption, Information Minister Sushma Swaraj calmed the House by saying that both the Prime Minister and the Home Minister had gone outside to verify the news.
When the session resumed, Chatterjee questioned how an opposition leader got the blast news before the government and its intelligence agencies.
A little later, Vajpayee returned and confirmed the Pakistani nuclear explosions and stated that this was a new development. Those members who had not yet spoken suggested to the Speaker that the discussion be postponed so that they could be better prepared in the wake of this new development.
It was clear to see that the Pakistani nuclear tests had completely changed the dynamics in Parliament.
Favourite Diplomat of Gandhis
Natwar Singh, who broke the groundbreaking news of Pakistan’s nuclear tests to India, passed away on 10 August at the age of 95. Singh kept the political and diplomatic corridors abuzz for the rest of the day. In his usual style, Vajpayee quipped that “Kunwar ji keeps his eyes set across the border.”
Natwar Singh was also a favourite diplomat of the late Prime Minister Indira Gandhi. It is believed that in 1971 when he was posted in Poland, he had established close relations with a diplomat of East Pakistan (Bangladesh) in the Pakistani embassy.
The diplomat passed on valuable information to Singh, who passed it directly to the Prime Minister and her close advisers. He is also credited with Indira Gandhi using his services to soften the opposition of the former royal families when she abolished their stipends.
Natwar Singh hailing from the royal family of Bharatpur, had passed the civil services examination in 1953 and opted for foreign service.
In those days, Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru used to personally interview new Foreign Service officers before appointing them to the service. Natwar Singh’s personality was deeply influenced by Nehru, and he often profusely praised India’s first Prime Minister.
But ironically, in the last days of his political career, he moved closer to the BJP and praised Prime Minister Narendra Modi, who never missed an opportunity to undermine Nehru.
He was the foreign minister during the Manmohan Singh government from 2004-2005. After the Congress-led alliance won the elections, Sonia Gandhi personally informed him that she was under pressure from Americans not to give him the foreign ministry. She offered him another ministry, but he refused. Since 1998, when Sonia Gandhi entered politics, he was her foreign policy advisor and had set eyes on this ministry for over a long time.
After resigning from the Foreign Service in 1984, Natwar Singh joined the Rajiv Gandhi government in 1985, first as Minister of Steel, Coal and Agriculture and then as Minister of State for External Affairs from 1986 to 1989.
Natwar Singh was recognised for his scholarly approach and his book reviews in national newspapers.
Interesting Stories
Whenever he was in the mood, he would regale the audience with several interesting stories. He has recorded many of them in his autobiography.
* Two years after joining the Foreign Service, he was seconded to the team that arranged the visit of the King of Saudi Arabia, Saud bin Abdulaziz, who had travelled with a large delegation that included many young princes.
During this visit, the royal delegation travelled to Agra where some of the princes, who availed the intimate services of some women paid them with gold biscuits instead of cash.
The news spread in the city and soon a large crowd of women gathered near the hotel. The situation escalated and the police had to intervene to restore law and order.
Prime Minister Nehru instructed the Chief of Protocol to inform the King. On hearing this, King Saud demanded a list of the princes, who were involved in such activities.
He said to the Chief of Protocol, “Give me the names of the princes, I will chop off their heads and send them to Nehru by evening.” The shocked officer hastily retreated and advised Nehru to forget this incident and not even mention it to the king.
* In March 1955, King Norodom Sihanouk of Cambodia visited India with five Buddhist monks. India had also included five Buddhist monks in its delegation. Both delegations conversed in the Pali language and understood each other well.
When they reached the hotel, the head of the Indian monks asked his counterparts whether they favoured certain dishes. They all said they wanted to eat beef. The Indian monks almost collapsed.
* Singh’s tenure as high commissioner in Pakistan in the 1980s earned him a friendship with President Zia-ul-Haq, with whom he shared the college. Both were graduates of St Stephen’s College in Delhi.
In 1981, when the college was celebrating its centenary, Zia-ul-Haq was keen to attend the celebrations. However, Prime Minister Indira Gandhi had reservations and did not agree to the visit. Singh advised Zia-ul-Haq to write an essay for a special centenary issue of the university magazine.
He wrote, and when Singh went to hand him the magazine, he found an essay by Augustine Paul. Zia immediately remembered that this man was his hostel mate and gave Singh a personalised letter and a signed photo to deliver to Paul. It took a while for Singh to find out that Paul was employed at the Indian Embassy in Bangkok.
After several months, Zia enquired from Singh that his former roommate had not replied to his letter. According to Natwar Singh, he realised to his horror that Paul had gotten into big trouble with the intelligence agencies. The latter were gunning for him because he had received a letter from a Pakistani president.
He had been summoned for questioning several times. His background was scrutinised. In the end, he was saved by the intervention of Singh through the Prime Minister.
A year later, Zia-ul-Haq visited St Stephen’s College during his trip to India for the Non-Aligned Movement (NAM) summit and had ahead of this visit hosted a group of students and teachers from the college in Pakistan.
War with Pakistan
Natwar Singh recounted a conversation with Rajiv Gandhi, the then-Indian Prime Minister, in January 1986, when he accompanied him to the airport to receive Afghan President Najibullah.
“When we were in the car, Rajiv asked: Natwar, what is the situation with Pakistan? Are we heading for war?”
At that time, the army under General Sundarji was conducting military exercises in Rajasthan, which had become a major problem.
Defence Minister Arun Singh had given his approval for the exercise without briefing the Prime Minister properly. He had told the Prime Minister that Pakistan was preparing for an attack on India.
Rajiv instructed Singh to enquire about the Pakistani military’s movements from the US and Soviet Union ambassadors in Delhi.
The ambassadors reported that there was no military activity across the border.
“Rajiv immediately called a meeting and when we repeated what the ambassadors had said, Arun Singh questioned the credibility of the American and Soviet satellites,” writes Natwar Singh.
A few days later, Arun Singh was transferred to the finance ministry and subsequently forced to resign from the ministry and then from the Rajya Sabha. In the meantime, Zia-ul-Haq also visited India on the pretext of watching a cricket match, which was a convenient excuse to discuss the possibility of war and the dangerous consequences it could bring.
Exit from Ministry
In 2004, Natwar Singh became the External Affairs Minister, his long-cherished dream, to follow his mentor Nehru’s footsteps and shape India’s foreign policy.
But a year later, after the American Paul Volcker report revealed that Indian politicians and businessmen had received oil vouchers from Iraqi President Saddam Hussein, he was first removed from the ministry and then forced to resign.
The Congress party abandoned him and his son Jagat Singh. It is said that when negotiations on the nuclear deal with the US began, the interlocutors demanded his removal from the foreign ministry. Singh says he opposed the American war in Iraq, which led to the US exerting pressure on him in retaliation.
In his autobiography “One Life Is Not Enough”, Singh wrote that life is like a journey without a map, full of introspection and with no guarantee of success.
The Gandhi-Nehru family, with whom he had built up a close relationship, did not support him. There are no true friends in politics, only interests. He too abandoned them and even his ideology and sat with those, who ridiculed his mentor Nehru day in, and day out.
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