The sordid affair of Charrandass in New Delhi

Oct 31, 2022 Letters

Dear Editor,

Kaieteur News – I rather not speak of the action(s) of the now recalled High Commissioner to India, but those around it, especially His Excellency, the Foreign Affairs Ministry, and the regulars who have lost their tongue.

Thanks to Watergate and Nixon, we are back to that smoking gun of a question: what did the President know, when did he know, and what did he decide to do about it on first learning? Repeat: first learning of the matter. I commend the President for executing what was the only action that he could have taken. Though he is not due the courtesy, his word is taken that he only knew now. I don’t see how. But it is not, should not, be the end of this tawdry episode. Rather, it is the beginning that goes back to that three-pronged inquiry of three sentences hence. I hear of this unpinned grenade, the damning video, being the deathblow, but what if there was no piece of corroborating video evidence? At least, the man in New Delhi should have been summoned home to give an arm’s length accounting, based on the Police development, and let his credibility stand or fall.

I hear of claims of cover-up, which have been somewhat neutralized by the President’s seemingly conclusive action. I would think that some morsel of detail would have been exchanged between Georgetown and New Delhi, and given the high official that was identified, something had to be said and done. Yet, 14 months passed, and only when some of the startling barebones elements seeped into the public domain did the Ministry of Foreign Affairs saw it necessary to say something. The central message and climax of the Ministry’s release was that the matter is “closed.” Just like that, and be done with all snoops, be gone everyone. Some things just don’t go away just like that; can’t be wished away so easily. India is not Guyana.

Editor, was that video kept away from Guyana for 14 months? I have difficulty contemplating that it would not have been part of the Indian Police case file, a huge part of its investigation. Given the rank of the senior diplomat allegedly involved in this sordid affair, I think that it would been shared with the Guyana High Commission. I hear certain words presented: There is this problem, and it is causing consternation here, considering the profile of the abused, and there should be consultation with Georgetown. Helpful recommendation forthcoming.

I am reluctant to conclude that whoever took that video held it for 14 months or that Indian officials kept it to themselves. And, on the other side of this situation, that all Guyanese officials in India were totally in the dark as to the video development. I will ride the tiger: it is my belief that official and diplomatic courtesy mandated that that video be shared. What the Guyanese official(s) then did or didn’t do is the crux. I doubt that there is one Guyanese official in New Delhi who withheld it, so that the Minister of Foreign Affairs and the President would not have to do a dirty deed – recall the disgraced diplomat. To give both plausible deniability. Moreover, I think that the video would have been shared so that the Indian Government would exert subtle pressure on the Guyana Government to do the one thing that was left: get the man out of India. In that way, the Indians don’t have to bite the bullet and dirty their own hands (and Guyana relationship) by taking harsh, but appropriate, unilateral action. I think recalling the man was preferable to him being expelled. It is putting a noble, authoritative, presidential seal on what disfigured woman, man, and this country. The question I chew on is this: is the President sharing the fullness (and the timeliness )of his knowledge in this sordid story?

An interesting aside is that the media men and women who are usually energetic about Mother India, motherhood, womanhood, and all that they say that they stand for, are without voice, without pen, and without the nonpartisanship that they pretend to represent. Clearly, all those disappear when it involves what menaces the standing of party and government. What the man did over there was bad, those who prefer to shy away uncharacteristically from critical comment come across as worse than who and what they try to make go quietly and quickly into the night. It wouldn’t and didn’t. Just ask Foreign Affairs and president. Meanwhile, men are recommending and men are lobbying to be the replacement. Lovely country, isn’t it?

Sincerely,

GHK Lall

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The sordid affair of Charrandass in New Delhi

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Follow on Tik Tok @Glennlall

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