Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh claimed many Bangladeshis are “very anti-Indian”, in controversial remarks posted on his official website which were later removed for being “off the record”.
The comments, splashed in Bangladeshi newspapers on Saturday, could strain relations between the South Asian neighbours just as they have been improving.
Singh’s statements to newspaper editors in New Delhi earlier in the week come ahead of an official visit to Bangladesh by Indian foreign minister S.M. Krishna set for July 6 to 8.
Singh’s claim, posted on the prime minister’s website on Wednesday, said “we must reckon that at least 25 percent of the population of Bangladesh swear by the Jamaat-e-Islami and they are very anti-Indian”.
The Jamaat-e-Islami is Bangladesh’s largest religious party and was part of the four-party allied government between 2001 and 2006.
The prime minister’s office removed the remarks from his website on Friday, saying they had been made “off the record”.
“We put it out by mistake,” the Indian Express quoted the prime minister’s media adviser, Harish Kharem, as saying.
The gaffe came as Singh has been battling opposition criticism that he is an ineffective, lame-duck premier who has turned a blind eye to a recent slew of domestic corruption scandals.
Singh’s comments became headline news on Saturday in Bangladesh’s mass-circulation daily Samakal, which titled its lead article: “Uproar over Manmohan’s comments”.
In a damage-control move late on Saturday, India said Singh’s statements were “by no means intended to be judgmental.”
The people of India “have the greatest affection for the people of Bangladesh,” the Indian High Commission (embassy) in Dhaka said in a statement.
