Minding the PM146;s language

The questions were: how serious was Vajpayee, was this a threat, was this an empty threat, if war when, and if that was answered heads of madrasas were to analyze where and why also. Vajpayee was at his eloquent best. There was only a five-minute audio gap and he was speaking on a 8216;8216;store8217;8217; and 8216;8216;forward8217;8217; mode on a ratio of 1:5. One word that he uttered took five seconds to be converted to understandable text. The ratio was the same for the questions put to him.

Extracts from Musings Chapter 4 8211; 8216;How we won the war of words in Kashmir8217;: 8216;8216;My remark about the sky being clear was taken out of context as usual. In Jammu I had looked up at the sky because I heard the pilot wondering whether the weather was clear for a take-off. I was also thinking of another book of poems on skies. In fact I asked George and LKA to be on my side at the press conference because I was suddenly missing Pawan Verma, my translator. I had asked my two ministerial colleagues only to translate the questions but LKA was also supplying the answers!

Vajpayee8217;s reference to the skies and threat of lightening sent analyists scurrying. Mars News called a former Army Chief to analyze what Vajpayee meant when he said that lightening can strike. He replied that in previous wars there were always coded messages like 8216;the sky is blue8217; meant 8216;I will shoot you8217;, 8216;roses are red8217; meant 8216;we are only shooting at each other silly8217; but 8216;lightening can strike8217; could mean anything. The ISI analysts concluded that this meant that Israeli paratroopers could land any moment. Even the CIA opined that as a purely precautionary measure all Indians and Pakistanis with the surname Badal be rounded up in the US for routine questioning since Vapayee had said badal mandra raha hai.

The impact of Vajpayee8217;s press conference was so great that no one 8212; perhaps not even Vajpayee 8212; realised what India was upto. Musharraf told his equally foxed ISI chief that he was so confused that he was planning to quit. He said, 8216;8216;I have launched proxy wars but never done something as a shameful as launching a proxy war of words.8217;8217; It was this state of confusion and panic that compelled him to address the nation. He said there was no cross border terrorism, that the minority community was being harassed in Gujarat, that India was behind many of the terrorist killings, that Dawood was actually a Hindu etc. There was an expectation that India would give a fitting reply. The three Service chiefs were waiting for orders. They had been waiting for six months.

The turning point for Musharraf was the Jaswant Singh press conference the following day. The only new thing he said, according to analysts was: 8216;8216;Nirupama, let me answer everyone.8217;8217; Three English to English translators were on stand by in Pakistan. The ISI concluded later that since Jaswant was not provoked by Musharraf, India was about to launch a nuclear missile.

Extracts from Musings: 8216;8216;We were also shell shocked when Musharraf resigned. Jaswant said it was a victory of the policy of utmost restraint that helped, LKA said it was the pursuit of hot policy of words that worked.8217;8217;