More than a billion unsuspecting citizens of India feel extremely let down by the great Indian climb down from its earlier tough stance against Pakistan on the crucial issue of terrorism. It is a shameless climb down by India that has evoked knee-jerk adverse public opinion against Prime Minister Dr Manmohan Singh who only recently had won applause from the Indian citizens for his unequivocal talk on terrorism.

In his unwavering statement to Pakistan president Asif Ali Zardari when he met, for the first time after the dreadful Mumbai terror strike, ahead of the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation Summit meeting in Yekaterinburg in Russia in early June, Dr Singh had said that “I am happy to meet you but my mandate is limited to telling you that the territory of Pakistan must not be allowed to be used for terrorism against India that”.

This statement had in fact created a kind of euphoria in India as the people at last believed that the Indian government, after a series of flip-flop on the diplomatic initiative, has mustered courage to act tough against terrorism and its perpetrators, Pakistan. In fact, there was some public outcry in November last year immediately after the inhuman terrorist attack in Mumbai that India should attack Pakistan. But the people of this country had to witness a series of failures on the diplomatic front.

Now, all this euphoria of tough talk had gone down the drain due to the somersault resorted to by Dr Singh when he met Pakistan Prime Minister Yousuf Raza Gilani on the sidelines of the NAM Summit in Sharm El Sheikh, Egypt yesterday.

Against the expectation of repetition of his tough talk against Pakistan to bring to book the culprits responsible for the Mumbai attack, Dr Singh has conceded a great deal of ground to Pakistan. Dr Singh has shamelessly conceded that “action on terrorism should not be linked to the composite dialogue process and these should not be bracketed”. Instead of sticking to its stance that there can be no composite dialogue between India and Pakistan till action is taken against the perpetrators Mumbai terror attack, Dr Singh abruptly changed his stance, to the surprise of one and all.

Only time will tell, whether this will prove to be a good strategy or it will boomerang on us in future. As helpless creatures who periodically put unparalleled faith on the wily politicians in every five years, we can only just wait and watch!