Big Brother's Unbecoming Behaviour to the Little Brother

It's been announced that the Indian PM Dr Manmohon Singh has made a personal phone call on Monday (4th of July) to his Bangladesh counterpart Sheikh Hasina to tell her that he has accepted her invitation to visit Dhaka and he will make the trip in early September.(PM talks with Sheikh Hasina on the phone).

The announcement of the visit follows a controversial and uncharacteristic comment by Dr Singh that at the least caused embarrassment to the politicians and diplomats of both the countries who have become very optimistic about improving relations between these neighbours since the election of Sheikh Hasina's Awami League led government in Bangladesh.

His visit will be preceded by his foreign minister, home minister and the chairperson of the ruling Congress Sonia Gandhi. Issues on the agenda include, but not limited within, transit, narrowing of the trade gap, border killings, electricity import, water resources management, enclaves, border demarcation and cooperation in fighting terrorism.

It was almost unheard of Dr Manmohon Singh to lose his cool in the midst of most provocative opponents and critics, may it be at a formal forum or any informal gatherings. Neither has he any notoriety or otherwise of making any undiplomatic or offending remarks even against his arch rivals.

Since becoming Prime Minister of India in May 2004, there have been several occasions or crises when his country was at the brink of a war with its arch rival Pakistan and any slip ups or off-the- cuff offensive remarks by him in such circumstances could have been easily ignored or forgiven.

However, throughout those tumultuous political upheavals he maintained his softly-softly approach which led the Newsweek magazine in 2010 to crown him as 'the leader other leaders love'.

But, that uncharacteristic incident happened on June the 29th when he met with a group of selected editors - none of whom were known to be particularly hostile to Dr Singh or his government.  The interactions that took place between him and those editors were seemingly not much worthy of global news, except his comments on Bangladesh in which he, perhaps unintentionally, suggested that a quarter of the population of his neighbouring country that India helped to gain independence are in the fold of Pakistan's notorious military intelligence, ISI and Jamaat-e-Islami. (Full transcript of PM's Q&A session with Editors)

These comments ahead of his planned visit in coming months sent shockwaves in both Delhi and Dhaka. Bangladeshi politicians and diplomats alike famous for making sweeping comments on almost everything, were desperately trying to take covers either by saying they have not seen the transcripts or there was nothing to add as the Indian High Commission in Dhaka has issued a clarification noting that those remarks were off the record and have been removed from the PMO's website. Even the 'darling of the media' Bangladesh Foreign Minister was unavailable.

Some of the Indian diplomats and analysts were also dumbfounded on the question of statistics. A former Indian envoy to Dhaka, Deb Mukherjee told the BBC that he was surprised as Dr Singh's assertion of 25 per cent Bangladeshis supporting Jamaat-e-Islami was devoid of the fact that this right-wing Islamic party never got more than seven percent of the vote even after forging an alliance with another major political force, the BNP.

It was almost a re-enactment of former Indian Deputy Prime Minister L K Advani's comment that almost twenty million illegal immigrants from Bangladesh were causing real problem for his country. The twenty million figures had never been established by any official records and that assertion continuously dogged almost all bilateral talks for over a decade. (India seeks progress in migrant row )    

Many observers see Dr Singh's personal call to Sheikh Hasina as a soothing song to bury the recent aspersions against a large number of Bangladeshis who have been dubbed as anti-Indians. These critics of India allege that the big brother's behavior towards its little brother is not always reflective of mutual trust or respect.  

The unease that has been created over Dr Singh's controversial remarks may have now burdened the leaders of these two nations with more political risks if they want to make September's bilateral summit a success and achieve some real progress in resolving their long-standing disputes.