Thaindian News

New Delhi, July 16 (IANS) The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) Friday criticised the remarks by Pakistan Foreign Minister Shah Mahmood Qureshi about External Affairs Minister S.M. Krishna as “utterly irresponsible”, but also expressed disappointment with Krishna for not having “a firmer word on Pakistan” in his press conference here.
“We strongly condemn the utterly irresponsible comment of Shah Mahmood Qureshi against India and its foreign minister, and he has done this because basic diplomacy is absent in his brain,” BJP spokesperson Ravi Shankar Prasad told reporters here.

To Qureshi’s remark that Krishna was attending calls from New Delhi during the talks in Islamabad Thursday, the BJP spokesperson said it was “completely normal and right” for Krishna to have attended phone calls from the prime minister and other government officials while on a diplomatic mission and Qureshi had no right to make irresponsible remarks about it.

He said: “What does Qureshi want? For India’s foreign minister to talk to the army like you (Qureshi) do? Whose instructions do you take?”

Addressing the media after Krishna’s press meet in the capital, Prasad said: “I understand dignity and etiquette is needed, but the country’s pride is bigger. There should have been a firmer word on Pakistan after the manner in which Qureshi insulted India and its home secretary. This is humiliation to the country and we are disappointed in Krishna’s press conference.”

Prasad also asserted that New Delhi needed to be tougher in dealing with Islamabad and tell Pakistan that dialogue was not possible till anti-India terror was eliminated.

“The government of India must tell the government of Pakistan clearly that the anti-India terror should be eliminated. Unless you take effective and credible action against the perpetrators of the Mumbai attacks there is no need to have dialogue with Pakistan,” Prasad said.

Prasad said that the talks are “not getting anywhere” and that India is holding talks “with those who have no authority on any matter in Pakistan and that those who have the authority are not talking”.

“I ask the government of India to please introspect about the entire nature of the dialogue procedure with Pakistan,” Prasad added.

Prasad also criticised Krishna for not defending Home Secretary G.K. Pillai when Qureshi compared his remarks on the Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) with Hafiz Saeed’s anti-India utterances.

“It is unfortunate. I have no words to condemn that. They were equating terrorist Hafiz Saeed with one of our senior civil servants. And we were expecting India to condemn it. It has not happened, I am shocked. I regret he was not defended by India’s foreign minister,” Prasad said.

The BJP spokesperson said Qureshi was making an issue out of Pillai’s comment, which was nothing but a statement of Lashkar-e-Taiba operative David Headley that the ISI had a role in the Mumbai attack.

“They have no reply or content but they are comparing it (Pillai’s remarks) with Hafiz Saeed without taking any action,” Prasad said.