Wednesday, August 02, 2006
Jaswant Singh -Jassi jaisi koi nahi.
Jaswant With Collin
The NewsThe guessing game has begun in full earnestness about the alleged US mole at former prime minister PV Narasimha Rao's PMO after former external affairs minister Jaswant Singh made a mention about him in his book titled A Call to Honour.
Jaswant Singh has dropped broad hints. He has said that the person was an 'uncivil' civil servant. But he has not yet disclosed the name.
At a time when the Indo-US relations are at an all-time high, there is a risk that Jaswant's comments might make a difference. He has already been dared by Prime Minister Manmohan SIngh to come out in the open with the name.
But then why is Jaswant Singh not making the name public if he has enough evidence to back his claims? Does he really know who the mole is? Does he have enough evidence?
He says he has already told the name to the top two leaders of the BJP - Atal Bihari Vajpayee and L K Advani.
But the question is then, 'Why aren't there too many supporters of Jaswant Singh within the BJP and why is Jaswant Singh so reluctant to make the name public?'
Meanwhile, Singh has not yet got an appointment from the PM 'to share these details in confidence'.
But on Wednesday, he did decide to exclude the name of one person from his list of suspects from among Rao's bureacrats, that of former scientific advisor V S Arunachalam.
Even after that exclusion, there are quite a few who could be on the list of possible suspects according to Jaswant Singh's claims.
They include Amarnath Verma, former principal secretary to PM and one who was described as one of the most powerful man in his times; Bhuvanesh Chaturvedi, a minister of state in the PMO; Ram Khandekar, addlitional private secretary to the PM; Jitender Prasad, political advisor to the PM; Matang Singh, a minister of state in the PMO; Aslam Sher Khan, a minister of state in the PMO; and RK Prasad, press information advisor to the PM.
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