July 12, 2003	Saturday	Jumadi-ul-Awwal 11, 1424

NEW DELHI: Faced with mounting public pressure, India’s right-wing government may have to abandon plans to accede to a US government demand for it to send troops to post-war Iraq.

Although Indian officials are still assessing the pros and cons of the demand, India’s Additional Solicitor K.K. Sud told the Delhi High Court this week that there was nothing to suggest that the government would actually commit the troops.

Sud appeared for the government in the court, which is hearing a public interest petition filed by prominent advocate and civil rights activist P.N. Lekhi demanding that the court intervene and not allow Indian troops to work under the “command control” of US authority.

“The preamble of our constitution describes India as a sovereign nation. Allowing our troops to work under the Authority established by the occupying powers (in Iraq) would reduce the president of India to a subordinate functionary under the US president,” argued Lekhi.

The bench, consisting of Delhi High Court Chief Justice B.C. Patel and Justice A.K. Sikri, heard out Sud, who argued that the courts had no jurisdiction over vital foreign policy issues but reserved orders for a later day.

Still, the court may well provide the escape route for a government that that has been bending over backwards to please Washington. The Indian government has come up against severe censure by leading political parties and peace groups for even considering the dispatch of troops to Iraq — a request the US government has also made of other countries like Pakistan and Japan.

On Monday, British High Commissioner to India Rob Young reiterated at a public function the wish of the US and British coalition that invaded Iraq to have other countries join them. ”We are keen to see as many countries as possible, including India, participating in the process. India has unrivalled experience in peacekeeping in many countries and missions across the world.”

Young spoke of India as a “growing global power” and one that would have a “major voice in the changing world order” and should therefore expect that its “responsibility and authority” would grow further as well.

But India’s policymakers are not so sure, going by an editorial appearing in the latest edition of the ‘Panchjanya’, the mouthpiece of the Rashtiya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS), a militant organisation that is called the ‘mind and muscle’ of the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP).

The editorial asked why the Indian army should be sent to Iraq to “clean up the garbage left behind by the US forces”. It poured scorn on foreign ministry bureaucrats who seemed to think that an invitation to send troops to Iraq amounted to ”recognition of India’s growing role in world affairs”.

India, urged the Panchjanya editorial, would do better to recall its historical ties with Iraq and the fact that the “Iraqi people had a feeling of natural respect and affection for Indians”.

Said Sesahdri Chari, an RSS ideologue: “ The Americans have not found any weapons of mass destruction in Iraq and it is now time they left Iraq.”

The BJP’s (as well as that of the RSS) arch political rival, the opposition Congress party, would agree that the US army has overstayed in Iraq. Congress party spokesman Ashwani Kumar describes the issue as one “not of modality but of principle”.

Kumar, who was in Washington recently to explain his party’s viewpoint to US legislators and officials, said the BJP government cannot legally send troops to Iraq after India’s parliament had unanimously deplored the war on Iraq earlier this year.

Afsar Karim, a retired Indian army general and a member of India’s National Security Board (NSB), said it might be fine to send doctors, engineers and technicians. But to send in a combat division would be to “involve the Indian army in conflict with the civilian population in Iraq”.

Officially, India is still weighing its options on Washington’s request for its troops to be sent to Iraq.

Last week, R.M. Abhyankar, an experienced Iraq hand and secretary in the foreign ministry, completed a tour of the country to gain a first-hand impression of the situation on the ground.

Abhyankar made a 3,500-kilometre tour of Iraq, meeting with different Iraqi leaders including Jalal Talebani, leader of the Patriotic Union of Kurdistan and Masoud Barzani, chief of the Kurdistan Democratic Party who jointly control the northern areas.

According to officials here, if India does send troops, it is expected to provide between 15,000 to 20,000 troops that could be deployed in the relatively peaceful northern Iraq and in and around Mosul, the principal city in the area.

But even at that level, India would end up having the second largest military presence in Iraq after the United States itself.

Before his trip to Iraq, Abhyankar said India had long-term interests in the Gulf region since 60 to 70 percent of its oil comes from there. The country also relies on remittances sent by the large expatriate Indian population there.

Last month, a high-level delegation from the Pentagon arrived in New Delhi on orders of US President George W. Bush to answer questions that Indian officials may have regarding the modalities of troop deployment in Iraq.

Meanwhile, a public movement called ‘No Indian Troops in Iraq’ is gaining popularity with the intelligentsia, including university professors who released a statement saying that sending troops to Iraq went against India’s own struggle against colonialism.

Such a move would “do violence to all the values India has cherished since the freedom struggle”, it added. —Dawn/InterPress News Service.