NEW DELHI, Nov 8: Indian newspapers on Tuesday showered praise on Prime Minister Manmohan Singh’s decision to strip Foreign Minister Natwar Singh of his portfolio, but they agreed it had little to do with his unproven culpability in the Iraq oil-for-food deal.

“In his final three days as foreign minister, K. Natwar Singh has become India’s number one embarrassment. Deciding he would leave the foreign minister’s office kicking and screaming, he swung to reckless and extreme positions on foreign policy,” said the Indian Express in its editorial.

The newspaper said there were practical problems from Mr Singh’s ‘recent relapse into third worldism’.

His views lamenting the demise of the Soviet Union, in an interview, made him unfit to ‘represent India before those nations that see themselves as having gained independence from Soviet imperialism and communism — Georgia or Lithuania, for instance, or even the Czech Republic, the president of which is currently in India,” the Express said.

“In effect, Natwar Singh has just said he considers their sovereignty a tragedy. Neither can he now possibly go to the US or the United Nations without inviting ridicule...Natwar Singh’s new-found status as a diplomatic suicide bomber threatened to derail India’s Middle East policy. For his political survival, he linked this to an alleged articulation of Muslim aspirations.”

While the newspapers rapped his ideological leanings, Prime Minister Manmohan Singh sought to clear the air on India’s position on Iran’s nuclear programme at the forthcoming meeting in Vienna.

He said that intense consultations were underway with various countries to arrive at a consensus. “Talks are on with a lot of countries (ahead of the Nov 24 meeting of the IAEA Board of Governors) to evolve a consensus,” he told reporters.

The Hindu said the decision to remove Mr Singh from the foreign ministry looks like a half-measure. “However, it is a fair and defensible decision considering the serious flaws in the Volcker Committee’s politically charged approach to the investigation.”

The Hindu said India’s ‘interests and the imperatives of clean democratic politics demand that (a judicial probe into the affair) should be accomplished quickly — in a few weeks rather than many months. Meanwhile, serious issues suggesting an erosion of the independence of India’s foreign policy need to be sorted out.”