Click to play videoHas India been judicious in its response to developments in Tibet or has it allowed itself to be bullied by Beijing? That is the key issue Karan Thapar discussed on Devil’s Advocate with former defence minister George Fernandes.
Karan Thapar: As someone who has been a supporter of Tibet for 50 years, what’s your view of the Indian response to developments in Tibet?
George Fernandes: India has sold out to China.
Karan Thapar: Has India been bullied by China?
George Fernandes: Absolutely and it accepts it.
Karan Thapar: So this is a shameful response from India.
George Fernandes:Yes.
Karan Thapar: I want to discuss with you certain specific things. Was it fitting and proper that a meeting fixed between the Dalai Lama and the Vice President two months ago should have been canceled because it was going to happen in the present circumstances.
George Fernandes: It should not have happened and it shows what I said earlier…
Karan Thapar: That India has sold out to China?
George Fernandes:Yes.
Karan Thapar: In other words the Vice President should have met the Dalai Lama?
George Fernandes:Yes.
Karan Thapar: Would you say it was a discourtesy to cancel the meeting.
George Fernandes: Yes it is.
Karan Thapar: The second thing I want to discuss is the fact that the Indian Ambassador in Beijing allowed herself to be summoned by the Chinese foreign office at 2 in the morning. By attending on the Chinese at 2 in the morning did she end up belittling and demeaning India?
George Fernandes: Well our Government allowed it. It has no shame.
Karan Thapar: You are saying Delhi should have told the Ambassador in Beijing – you must not go at 2 AM in the morning, wait till the next day.
George Fernandes: Yes that is what it should have been elsewhere it is how it happens.
Karan Thapar: You know in fact as a former defence minister that Pakistani High Commissioner in Delhi have been summoned sometimes at the much earlier hour of 10 o’clock or 10:30 at night and they have refused to come. Should we have therefore behaved in the same way in Beijing?
George Fernandes: Our Government, as I said, surrenders everywhere.
Karan Thapar: This is surrender to China?
George Fernandes: Yes.
Karan Thapar: China has thirdly threatened that it will not allow the Olympic torch to come to India unless India can guarantee the security of the torch. How should New Delhi respond to this threat?
George Fernandes: I have asked all my colleagues and others and those who are with Tibet that they should prevent China from crossing our border with this torch.
Karan Thapar: You have told this to your supporters and you have told this to your Tibetan friends that they should prevent the torch coming successfully through Delhi?
George Fernandes: It should not be allowed to come to our borders.
Karan Thapar: In other words they should sabotage the torch and put out the flame?
George Fernandes: Yes. Whatever effort they have to make they should make that effort and it is not only in Delhi I have said or in India I have said but wherever the torch goes.
Karan Thapar: China on the other hand has praised India’s handling of Tibetan protest in India. Should we be proud of such praise or should we be embarrassed?
George Fernandes: That is a disgrace that China should say that India has done well.
Karan Thapar: It is an insult to India.
George Fernandes:Yes.
Karan Thapar: So we should be embarrassed by such praise from Beijing?
George Fernandes: It’s a disgrace.
Karan Thapar: Why does India get bullied by China so easily?
George Fernandes:I have a feeling that what happened years ago in 60s is still in many people’s minds and they can’t get out of it.
Karan Thapar: Is this therefore the fear?
George Fernandes:Yes that is what it is.
Karan Thapar: India is scared of China?
George Fernandes:Yes.
Karan Thapar: India is unable to standup because we are scared we could be beaten at another war by the Chinese?
George Fernandes: Yes.
Karan Thapar: You always believed that Pandit Nehru made a serious mistake in 1950 when he recognised Chinese sovereignty over Tibet.
George Fernandes: Yes.
Karan Thapar: In 2003 the Vajpayee government reiterated that position yet more explicitly. Did Mr Vajpayee make a mistake?
George Fernandes: It should not have been done.
Karan Thapar: So it was a mistake.
George Fernandes: I wouldn’t say mistake but an error.
Karan Thapar: You always believed that India should stand up to China. How did they receive you when you went to China as defence minister?
George Fernandes: I was well received. The Prime Minister had come to receive me.
Karan Thapar: Breaking protocol?
George Fernandes: I don’t know if it was protocol.
Karan Thapar: I believe he also put his personal plane at your disposal.
George Fernandes: Yes the entire plane was at my disposal.
Karan Thapar: For the full one week.
George Fernandes: For one full week and if I wanted to stay more as long as I stay there.
Karan Thapar: I believe they also tried to make you happy. They put women at your disposal.
George Fernandes: Not in that sense. Some people will think that I had some fun. I didn’t have any fun.
Karan Thapar: But the women were made available. You had three or four women with you all the time – pretty women.
George Fernandes: Yes. When I came back they were waiting at the doors.
Karan Thapar: Whenever you came back they were waiting at the door?
George Fernandes: Yes.
Karan Thapar: So China in other words, despite the fact that you are a critic, went out of its way to make you happy. This is proof that if you stand up to China, China respects you.
George Fernandes:Yes I believe that.
Karan Thapar: Military analysts say that there are Chinese military installations stretching from the Coco islands and Burma in the east, through Tibetan the north down through Gwadar in Pakistan in the west and then south into the Indian Ocean. Many people call this Chinese strings of pearls. Are they threat to India?
George Fernandes: Yes but nobody is caring for it.
Karan Thapar: You mean it’s a threat that Indian governments and Indian soldiers are ignoring?
George Fernandes: Yes it is ignored.
Karan Thapar: Could this string of pearls become a strangle hold on India.
George Fernandes: Yes it is.
Karan Thapar: It’s a serious threat.
George Fernandes: Yes it is.
Karan Thapar: You mean it.
George Fernandes: Yes.
Karan Thapar: Ten years ago in an interview to me you famously described China as potential threat No. 1. Today is that still the case or do you want to change your opinion?
George Fernandes: It is still the same threat No.1 and not only for us but for many countries.
Karan Thapar: Today China is a threat to the whole world?
George Fernandes: Yes.
Karan Thapar: But is China in a sense now becoming more of an enemy? Is it becoming more serious?
George Fernandes: Yes it is.
Karan Thapar: So today is China closer to be potential enemy No.1?
George Fernandes: From there it could become No.1.
Karan Thapar: So it could become an enemy today?
George Fernandes: It could become an enemy because from what we have seen it could go to that extent.
Karan Thapar: It could be to some degree an enemy?
George Fernandes: Yes.
Karan Thapar: In this circumstances how should India respond to China. You often talked about an economic boycott of Chinese goods, do you mean that.
George Fernandes: Yes I mean it because that is the way China could be told that what is happening with our country also and rest of the world, these things should not happen.
Karan Thapar: But you are serious an economic boycott of Chinese goods.
George Fernandes: Yes I am serious.
Karan Thapar: What about the Olympics. Should India boycott the Olympics?
George Fernandes: Both.
Karan Thapar: You are seriously saying to the government boycott 2008 Olympics in Beijing?
George Fernandes: Yes but whether our government would do it is the question.
Karan Thapar: So you are saying two things. Number one, do not let the Olympic torch pass peacefully through India, boycott it, sabotage it, put out the flame and you are saying sabotage or at least boycott the Olympics in 2008.
George Fernandes: Both.
Karan Thapar: In his autobiography published recently, Mr L K Advani says that he was never consulted before Jaswant Singh decided to escort three terrorists to Kandahar in 1999 and Advani says infact he only found out about it when it was happening. You were a minister in that government as defence minister, did Jaswant Singh go to Kandahar unilaterally or was there a decision taken by the senior members of the government that he should go.
George Fernandes: This matter was discussed when the situation developed.
Karan Thapar: So there was a meeting where ministers discussed this matter.
George Fernandes: There was a discussion among the ministers.
Karan Thapar: Senior ministers decided that Jaswant Singh should accompany the terrorists, it wasn’t unilateral action taken by Jaswant Singh.
George Fernandes: Yes I am certain.
Karan Thapar: Were you a part of that meeting?
George Fernandes: I was there.
Karan Thapar: Who were the other ministers in that meeting.
George Fernandes: I can’t remember at this moment.
Karan Thapar: But senior ministers were present.
George Fernandes: Yes all ministers were there.
Karan Thapar: All ministers.
George Fernandes: Yes.
Karan Thapar: So presumably Advani as home minister should have been present as well?
George Fernandes: Yes all of us were there.
Karan Thapar: This means that when Mr Advani says he wasn’t consulted he wasn’t informed his recollection is faulty?
George Fernandes: Perhaps at that particular point he may not have been there.
Karan Thapar: But perhaps its also possible his recollection could be faulty?
George Fernandes: I don’t think that he will lie on anything.
Karan Thapar: Not lie but he could be mistaken, he could be wrong in his memory.
George Fernandes: Yes that can happen.
Karan Thapar: I believe that behind the scenes as a defence minister you played a very important role in creating favourable conditions for the Agra Summit. I am told you had a series of secret dinners with the then Pakistan High Commissioner Ashraf Jahangir Qazi. Is that right?
George Fernandes: Yes.
Karan Thapar: You had secret dinners which no one knew about it.
George Fernandes: Yes.
Karan Thapar: And these dinners were to try and establish friendship and trust?
George Fernandes: Yes.
Karan Thapar: Were they successful.
George Fernandes: It was something that created a relationship between me and Qazi.
Karan Thapar: It also smoothen relations between India and Pakistan.
George Fernandes: Yes.
Karan Thapar: In May 2001 the government gave Qazi one week to leave the country but what people don’t know is that his last meal in India was a quiet personal dinner with you.
George Fernandes: Yes
Karan Thapar: In this house.
George Fernandes: Yes in this house.
Karan Thapar: So you as a defence minister knowing that your government had asked Qazi to leave the country nonetheless invited him to a quiet dinner because you wanted that personal relationship to remain.
George Fernandes: Yes.
Karan Thapar: It was a conscious deliberate decision.
George Fernandes: Yes.
Karan Thapar: Looking back six years later do you think the decision to ask Qazi to leave the country was mistaken.
George Fernandes: What I did was right.
Karan Thapar: But looking back at the government’s decision to ask Qazi to leave the country, do you think that was a mistake?
George Fernandes: That was a mistake.
Karan Thapar: It shouldn’t have happened.
George Fernandes: It shouldn’t have.
Karan Thapar: Today there is a lot of controversy about the Barak missiles that were ordered when you were defence minister. Are you being picked up on and targeted by your enemies?
George Fernandes:Yes that’s what is happening and I know from where it has come up.
Karan Thapar: Where is it come from?
George Fernandes: It comes only from one place - the Congress.
Karan Thapar: Why is Congress targeting you.
George Fernandes: Because it hates me firstly and it hates me because I bring out there corruption. If you remember that they called me that I was making money on the coffins, I was drinking blood of the jawans and making money. Congress and its supporters went on preventing me from doing my job as minister and the president of their party would lead them.
Karan Thapar: Is there a personal animosity between you and Sonia Gandhi?
George Fernandes: I have no animosity. I stand for truth, where truth is not I am not.
Karan Thapar: Are you saying she stands for lies?
George Fernandes: Yes.
Karan Thapar: Your are saying she is a liar.
George Fernandes: Yes she is a liar.
Karan Thapar: Sonia Gandhi is a liar?
George Fernandes: Absolute Liar. I can give you ‘N’ number of matters where she has lied. I will tell you why I am saying this. When our government fell and the Congress government came, I told Dr Manmohan Singh to take this matter in your hands and tell me where I have taken money or anything.
Karan Thapar: What did he do?
George Fernandes: He send that letter to the then defence minister and then nothing came. He also didn’t reply. I wrote another letter and then it was sent to Antony. They are all good persons. And they also must have been told ‘you don’t just write’.
Karan Thapar: You mean Sonia Gandhi stopped them.
George Fernandes:Yes.
Karan Thapar: Which is why you think she is picking on you.
George Fernandes:Yes of course.
Karan Thapar: I believe you are writing your own autobiography.
George Fernandes: Yes.
Karan Thapar: When will it be published.
George Fernandes: It may take a year or more.
Karan Thapar: Is it going to reveal everything.
George Fernandes: Everything.
Karan Thapar: Your whole life.
George Fernandes: My whole life and of some others.
Karan Thapar: So many reputations will hang as a result.
George Fernandes: Yes.
Karan Thapar: Will you be open and frank about Tehelka.
George Fernandes: That’s to be seen then.
Karan Thapar: And will you open and frank about the Janata government and the Vajpayee government?
George Fernandes: Whatever there is that has to be brought out, I will bring it out.
Karan Thapar: So all the truth will be told.
George Fernandes: Yes.
Karan Thapar: And therefore many people’s reputations could suffer as a result.
George Fernandes: Yes.
Karan Thapar: A pleasure talking to you on Devil’s Advocate.
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