New Delhi, Feb 7 (Inditop.com) There are theories galore on what prompted India’s sudden offer to Pakistan for foreign secretary-level talks. It bears the imprint of the prime minister himself and the new national security adviser (NSA), many in the strategic community believe.
It so happens that Foreign Secretary Nirupama Rao rang up her Pakistani counterpart Salman Bashir around two weeks ago and invited him to visit New Delhi for talks, barely days after Shivshankar Menon took charge as the NSA.
Unlike his predecessor M.K. Narayanan, who was said to have a hardline approach towards Pakistan, Menon, a former Indian envoy to that country, shares the prime minister’s enthusiasm for out-of-the-box thinking to turn around relations with Pakistan which Manmohan Singh clearly wants to be seen as a legacy of his prime ministerial tenure.
But some mysteries refuse to go away. Policy wonks are having a tough time trying to understand why it took Pakistan 10 days to respond when it has been relentlessly pitching for the resumption of composite dialogue.
