Ramana, of course, the labels and editorials need to be rejected by us because they are through the American prism and hence subject to biases. It may also be that what are quoted are possibly not ad verbatim because I doubt if they were recorded and then transcribed. When the diplomat goes back to office and files the report, he/she will have to do it from memory and exact words cannot be recalled. Nor can the other party remember today exactly what he/she spoke three years back. It works both ways. However, diplomats are expected to report what they see and hear. They may add their comments and analysis but, I, for one, would reject them in this case. In many cases, even the American State Department would come to its own conclusions not always getting carried away by what the diplomat at Delhi says because they may have other sources of information that the Delhi diplomat has no access to. I would therefore go by the 'quoted sentences' but not by the interpretations that a diplomat also provided. As I see it, there is no need for a foreign diplomat to fabricate such spoken words.ramana wrote:SSridhar, I see that verbatim MKN says something and the cables have their own editorials! He suggests something and the US side adds to interject themsleves and now these leaks give credence. I wish some one trained in legal analsysi goes thru the cables and sees what Indian side said and what the US sider is reported to have suggested. At superficial level these cables are similar to colonial trading companies factor reports to directors back home. They have biases and stuff that the directors want to hear. And mostly highlevel dilli billi party gossip with classified labels attach to it. Indian anger at TSP perfidy after 26/11 can be seen by just reading the BRF. No need for fancy labels on that.
Quite possible. As I said earlier, when I was much young, I used to ridicule Mrs. Indira Gandhi's proclivity to see an American hand everywhere. I enjoyed the Piloo Mody badge, "I am an American (or CIA ?) agent". Later, I realized there could be some truth in it. These cables and what we are witnessing in the last decade or so confirm this.A big question why would Satish Sharma aide show the cash to a US diplomat? Was the cash from them? Its appears good faith effort to show US that funds are provided are not being siphoned off.
These cables may not reveal all aspects of the conspiracy. Certainly, the Congress was firing on all cylinders to get the Nuclear Bill passed. They had an uncertain proposition in the Parliament. As the cables reveal (and possibly subsequent events reveal), the Congress wanted to get the support of 19 MPs (and possibly 24) in order to get a safe majority. They were sure that some MPs might take the money and yet not vote for them. This is what seemed to have happened with Ajit Singh who the TV reports reveal took 10 Crores for each of his three MPs and yet voted against the Bill. So, the INC tried multiple things. They approached the Shiv Sena which is confirmed (because the Shiv Sena had even then claimed this). They tried to divide the BJP through the son-in-law of Vajpayee as the cables reveal, but this is not confirmed (but Sudheendra Kulkarni of the BJP exposed the approach to the BJP MPs by Amar Singh through a sting operation of the CNN-IBN channel).Further at that time, it was the Samajwadi Party with Amar Singh doing the cash for votes deal and INC took a high moral stance. So what are these cables painting a different picture? Amar Singh even went around to US and claimed to have collected funds.
That appears to be a BJP sting operation. That is what Sudheendra Kulkarni (then with BJP but not now) claimed in his interview yesterday. He says he masterminded the sting and finally the JPC that was setup to inquire the 'Cash-for-Vote' scandal accused himself and wanted the GoI to investigate him. He also said that the CNN-IBN channel did not hand over the complete set of tapes to the Speaker, Somnath Chatterjee though whatever has been given were enough to nail Amar Singh.Also recall CNN_IBN or NDTV was suppsoed to record the cash for votes transaction and did something else. Were theses guys also reproting to embassy folks?
The American Embassy's efforts were to assess what was going to happen to the nuclear bill, IMO. The Americans were equally nervous because a lot was at stake for Bush.
No cables have appeared in The Hindu so far on this aspect. We will wait and see. The Hindu may have its own agenda and the K.Santhanam issue may not figure in it. It may also be that not all cables that went back & forth between the US State Department and the American Embassy were captured by Bradley Manning. Therefore, it could be a selective leak but not necessarily a bogus one.And any comments on the huge brouhaha on K.Santhanam's disclosures at that time? If the cables are absent about that aspect then these leaks are bogus and highly selective to influence policy.
(yeah i know there was some murmur from indian bank scam). It is also fun watching unditv BJP makes it to headlines even for being approached on teh trust vote 
also no mention of AKA until now in the cables, may be he is cat on wall (gopi) when it comes to relations with unkil