Moscow’s red carpet for PM has a wrinkle

With just one official day, November 12, available for meetings, India tried to explain its “practical difficulties” but ultimately gave in and agreed to separate talks between Singh and Russian PM Viktor Zubkov. And so Russia has agreed to call the PM’s visit on November 11-13 an “official visit.”

These are essentially issues of protocol and the categorization of a visit determines the kind of hospitality, ceremonial functions and meetings that a visiting dignitary may have in the itinerary. The two sides have been holding summit-level meetings at the level of the Prime Minister and Russian President for past seven years alternatively in Russia and India.

Russia made it clear this time that unless the two PMs meet, this would be treated as a “working visit”. This would have been the first ever downgrade in protocol between the two traditional partners given that former PM Atal Bihari Vajpayee’s visit was, at one point, considered a state visit by Moscow.

But Russia is said to have resisted these arguments despite the crammed schedule for the PM. To the extent, sources said, Russia seemed to suggest that PM must meet his Russian “counterpart”, knowing well that the PM was the head of the Government and his counterpart would be Putin in Russia.

Finally, India agreed to hold a separate meeting between the two PMs in a bid to at least get it termed an “official visit”. A working visit, sources said, is a concept used by the West for visits planned suddenly without any prior invite and hence, all the ceremonial and protocol elements are kept to the minimum. This, however, is a pre-planned visit which flows from...