Musharraf comments were quoted out of context: Indian NSA

NEW DELHI: Indian National Security Adviser (NSA) MK Narayanan said on Wednesday the media had quoted him out of context from his comments on former president Pervez Muhsarraf and US-India ties under Obama in a Monday interview with CNN-IBN.

“Selective quotes taken out of context from the detailed answers have tended to give a distorted idea of what was actually said,” he said in a statement released by the Indian Prime Minister’s Office (PMO) to end the controversy over Indian Defence Minister Pranab Mukherjee contradicting him. Narayanan had been quoted as saying it was much easier to deal with the Musharraf regime than with the present democratic government in Pakistan and hoped that the Obama regime in the United States would appreciate India’s position on Kashmir and other issues of the region.

He said his comments were made in the context of specific questions asked by host Karan Thapar. But Narayanan did not say anything in the statement about his claim that Islamabad had responded to a dossier of information by New Delhi with two sets of questions – which Mukherjee had contradicted.“The underlying theme of the reply to the question on Indo-US relations was the high expectation India had from the Obama administration with a hope being expressed that it would be possible for India to make the new administration appreciate India’s position and views on the region, including Kashmir,” the statement said.

BJP: Meanwhile, the opposition Bhartiya Janata Party (BJP) has called for ‘concerted efforts’ by the Indian government to ‘nail down Islamabad’.“Instead of the government talking about everything through the media, concerted efforts should be reflected on the ground to nail down Islamabad,” BJP spokesman Ravi Shankar Prasad told reporters. Regarding contradicting statements by Foreign Minister Pranab Mukherjee and National Security Adviser MK Naryanan, he said such contradictions on the crucial issue “sends wrong signals and enables Islamabad to mount international pressure against India”. “Who should the country believe in?” Prasad asked, calling on the Indian government to “please speak in one voice, for the sake of country”.