BENGALURU: External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar on Tuesday said if tensions continue to rise in the Middle East, it will have big consequences for India as oil prices will go up.
“This is going to translate into import costs, shipping costs, insurance costs, energy costs, and again oil prices will go up,” he said during an interaction with senior editors in Bengaluru.
India’s main concern and focus right now is the ship (seized by Iran near the Strait of Hormuz) with 17 Indians as part of the crew, and how to get them back, he said. On the situation in the region, the minister said there was a lot of pressure on Israel to de-escalate, but the feeling in Israel is different from the rest of the world. The next few days will see the pressure within Israel versus the pressure from the rest of the world and how it will play out, he said.
“We are already so close to the polls….We are looking at months and we are not looking at weeks. I don’t think it will have an impact on the polls,” Jaishankar said, responding to a question on the increase in oil prices, resulting in an increase in petrol and diesel prices leading to retail inflation and its impact on the BJP’s prospects at the Lok Sabha polls.
The minister said that at the national level people do not believe in Congress’ guarantees, as nationally people associate free ration, housing, electricity, water, and roads with Prime Minister Narendra Modi. “I have been in government for almost 50 years now. Often people say, we also had a scheme. Yes, they had a scheme. I began my career in the state, in Belagavi as a trainee officer. [Then CM] Devaraj Urs had a scheme for giving houses to Dalit villagers, but you get five houses in a year. Today, in the same place, you get 5000 houses,” he said.
Jaishankar rejected the opposition's allegations of Centre’s injustice to Karnataka in releasing drought relief funds and tax devolution. The minister said drought relief is supposed to be provided by the state from the SDRF (State Disaster Response Force) and the central government's component to that was given. The Home Ministry has written to the Election Commission of India seeking permission to release funds under NDRF (National Disaster Response Force) to give to the states, including Karnataka, he said.
On speculation over his contesting the Lok Sabha polls from Bengaluru, Jaishankar said first the issue was to contest or not to contest, then the next issue was from where to contest. The general feeling in the party was that he would be more useful while deployed in multiple places rather than contesting from one place, he said.
“People were drawing wrong conclusions,” he said, responding to speculation that he may also contest from Thiruvananthapuram.
In Thiruvananthapuram, in the last two elections, the BJP got around 30% of votes and in a triangular contest, the challenge was to get an additional 7% to 8% of votes, which takes you through, he said. “Rajeev (Chandrashekar) has a possibility. He gets young people. He has an appeal there,” he added.
On the issue of granting dual citizenship, the minister said the general sense now is that the problems of dual citizenship outweigh the benefits. “At the moment, I don’t see that happening, but I am not ruling it out forever,” he said.
