The 'Foot in the Mouth' Expertise Amongst Politicians

Recently, two ministers from different countries visiting the Indian sub-continent were afflicted by the 'Foot in the Mouth' disease. These people have made no attempts to realize that as ministers, their words are bound to get sancicity as the voice of their government, and not as a silly personal opinion.

So, when Anura Bandaranaike, the bachelor brother of former Sri Lankan President Chandrika Kumaratunga referred to the Indian High Commissioner to Sri Lanka Ms.Nirupama Rao as "the pretty envoy" during the course of his speech in the Lankan Parliament and asked her "to look after the Indian embassy and not to interfere in Sri Lanka's internal affairs", the rest of the 224 members present in the parliament squirmed in embarassment. Raising voices against another country's envoy is nothing new in politics, however, making an unwarranted comment like 'pretty envoy' will not be taken as a compliment. Anura's sudden volte face against India caught everyone by surprise and before there was any adverse reaction, President Mahinda Rajapakshe called up Nirupama Rao and clarified that the government does not stand by his Minister's remark.

If that incident created just a mild flutter, it was because of another comment by an Indian Minister that created quite a few ripples.

There is this India-Brazil-South Africa (IBSA) forum that was started when Vajpayee led NDA Government was in power. It is a trilateral forum aimed at increasing cooperation between the three countries in certain identified areas. It is being said that cooperation among the forum members were getting better each year and the three nations stood to gain from the collective hobnobbing. Prime Minister Manmohan Singh was to visit Brazil this month to participate in the next round of meetings in the IBSA forum. Prior to his visit, some ground work was being done and India's Minister of State for Commerce Jairam Ramesh was in Brazil as part of the same.

It was at this time that the devil caught Jairam's tongue. In an interview to a Brazilian newspaper, Jairam Ramesh reportedly ridiculed the very idea of IBSA. Throwing diplomacy to the winds, he further said that the idea of India and Brazil being 'natural allies' was 'naive'. Those statements kicked off a diplomatic firestorm with Brazil asking India to 'correct' the picture before the Prime Minister arrives for the IBSA summit.

Brazilians are extra sensitive about the issue because they have their Presidential elections in three weeks' time and any such views, even by a junior minster are bound to make President Lula Da Silva's position more vulnerable. Brazilian Foreign and Trade Minister let his strong disappointment known through Indian High Commissioner in Brasilia that made PMO in India issuing a statement that Jairam Ramesh was not authroised to speak on the issue. Further, to cool down the tempers, Jairam's senior Kamal Nath advanced his own trip by a day to the South American nation.

What Jairam was thinking before making such remarks would forever remain a mystery. Until last week Jairam Ramesh, has been creating an impression that he is one of the promising crop of young ministers at the helm. Commerce Ministry is one of the important ministries in India that requires the incumbent minister to be savvy and tough, particularly in the light of the fact that it is the Commerce Minister who needs to negotiate for the country with the super powers at WTO. In view of its importance, this ministry would traditionally go to heavy weights in the cabinet. The recent occupants of this ministry were Murasoli Maran, Arun Jaitely and now Kamal Nath. With such super influential minister's towering presence at the ministry, it is not easy for a Minister of State to make any impression on the job. In other words, it is a common view that Minister of State in Commerce is nothing but a dummy post. Jairam Ramesh did a good job in breaking that myth by negotiating with his senior minister Kamal Nath and got some independence in some areas of work. In short, Jairam got himself some work to do and did some good work in those areas.

But whatever his thoughts were and however true they may have been, when on a mission to represent the country, it is always interpreted he was speaking for the country and not as an individual. Sadly, he failed to remember that.

Jairam Ramesh is not the first Indian Minister to make such out of turn undiplomatic comments. In the previous government, there was a gentleman by name George Fernandes, who is the grand daddy of all such gaffes. In 1998, when India tested its nuclear devices to the world's dismay, George - who was India's Defence Minister that time had dragons on his mouth to say that China is India's enemy number one. This was at a time when Indian and China were slowly trying to forget the bitterness of the 1960s and were trying to build bridges. That statement was factually correct, but politically stupid.

Although, this particular statement made George Fernandes appear like a fool in front of the media, it was a common knowledge that it is very easy to provoke the then Defence Minister. If newspapers went thirsty without controversial stories, they could put a microphone in front of George to generate one. Exactly a year later in 1999, when Indian Army was busy flushing out mercenaries from the heights of Kargil, there used to be a daily review of strategy and action plan at the Prime Minister's House. In order to avoid George Fernandes from making out of turn statements to the media and kick off another diplomatic duel, he was asked to use a special gate at Vajpayee's residence where he wouldn't run into media persons even by accident.

However, such undiplomatic statements are not the exclusive domain of the Asian Ministers alone. Every country will definitely have got one such character to give comic relief (Heard of George Bush?). But listing all of them here would take the shine away from Jairam and Anura. They have duly earned the title "Superstars of the Week". Its only fair that we let them keep it for a while.