New Delhi, May 12 (Inditop.com) Environment and Forests Minister Jairam Ramesh paid a surprise visit to Home Minister P. Chidambaram Wednesday, a day after he was ticked off by the prime minister for his remarks criticising the Indian government’s policy towards Chinese companies, an official said.
“It was a one-to-one meeting at North Block. What transpired between them is not known,” a home ministry official said.
The environment minister had declared in Beijing Saturday that the policies of the Indian home ministry and security establishment towards Chinese companies were “alarmist and paranoid”.
In Beijing to attend a global meet on climate change, he said there was danger that cooperation with China flowing from the Copenhagen spirit would end unless New Delhi changed “a needlessly restrictive, alarmist approach” to Chinese investment in infrastructure.
In New Delhi, Manmohan Singh telephoned Ramesh and pulled him up, making it clear that he cannot comment on the functioning of ministries outside his domain, that too on foreign soil.
The home ministry had earlier written to the prime minister office that any objections it has are company-specific, not country-specific.
The home ministry had expressed reservations about allowing the import and installation of equipment from Chinese telecom giant Huawei and other companies on the ground that they could pose a security challenge in the highly-sensitive telecom sector.
