The Ministry of External Affairs is watching helplessly as ambassador-level officers are openly flaunting their so-called ‘‘connections’’ and the system is unable to do anything. The latest scandal in the Indian Foreign Service is swirling around Vijay Kumar, who was unceremoniously withdrawn about six weeks ago from the top job in Mauritius because of a number of ‘‘irregularities’’ and posted to Zimbabwe. Kumar has managed to return to Port Louis about a week ago, ostensibly to ‘‘prepare’’ for the visit of Minister for External Affairs Yashwant Sinha to that island country that began today. Photographs of Kumar standing beside Sinha and participating in all the foreign minister’s key meetings that go on till tomorrow — including one with Mauritian Prime Minister Anerood Jugnauth — have horrified onlookers. Many ask why P S Haer, India’s Ambassador to Teheran, who has already been named Kumar’s successor in Mauritius, could not have been sent to Port Louis for the visit. Clearly, neither Sinha nor foreign secretary Kanwal Sibal was unable to prevent Kumar — who is said to openly talk about his ‘‘high-level connections’’ that reach all the way up to the Prime Minister — from returning to Mauritius for Sinha’s visit. Notwithstanding the fact that Kumar has a host of vigilance inquiries pending against him. Interestingly, the ambassador-designate to Zimbabwe is now said to be putting it out in Port Louis that he is ready to stay on until the time the Prime Minister makes a visit to Mauritius sometime towards the end of this year. Another scandal revolves around Tara Singh, India’s previous ambassador to Guyana in Latin America and now posted to Belarus. The story goes that when Minister of State Digvijay Singh visited Guyana a couple of months ago, he was asked by none other than the President of Guyana to ‘‘recall’’ him. Guyana, like a number of countries in that region (for instance Surinam), has a large number of people of Indian origin who arrived there as indentured labour about 150-odd years ago and in recent decades played an important role in the country’s political life. Digvijay Singh was said to have gone red in the face over the unusual request. Singh has since been posted to Minsk, Belarus, a country which neighbours Russia and with which New Delhi has been attempting to develop new relationships, such as in laser technology. The third case relates to K M Meena, India’s previous ambassador to Oman, who has been in the limelight in recent days because of unsubstantiated allegations he has made against a fellow IFS officer. Meena’s charges are said to be much the result of his being pulled out of the key post in Muscat midway through his tenure and posted to Vietnam. Meena rebelled, saying he did not want to go to Hanoi. Many believe that his unsavoury leaks to the press are a result of the fact that he did not want to leave comfortable Muscat. So what do Yashwant Sinha and Kanwal Sibal think about the ‘‘errant’’ officers under their charge? There’s a studied silence in their response. When asked about these cases, the MEA spokesperson declined to comment. It seems there’s little the system can do to punish people with ‘‘irregular’’ records. The most that can be done, MEA officials say, is to post people to faraway countries so as to minimise the potential harm to India.
