New Delhi, February 2
The government is going to undertake a thorough review of the ongoing military stand-off with Pakistan after crucial Indo-Russia talks beginning tomorrow which are going to focus on defence cooperation and supply of strategic weapons, including nuclear submarines.

Two important back-to-back visits are taking place from Russia: Foreign Minister Igor Ivanov’s 20-hour-long visit here from tomorrow evening and Deputy Prime Minister Iliya Klebanov’s three-day visit to India from February 5.

Apart from the issue of leasing of two Russian nuclear submarines to India, an important thing going to happen during Mr Klebanov’s visit is signing of a military protocol between India and Russia.

The protocol will mean that the two countries would prepare a list of weapon systems, armaments and defence hardware which India may require from Russia and the time-frame by when Russia can deliver these.

According to well-placed sources here, a crucial meeting of the Cabinet Committee on Security (CCS) would be convened after these two visits where the Indian strategy would come up for a thorough review.

The visits by two Russian leaders are taking place in the backdrop of a spate of intemperate statements from the Pakistani leadership recently and the fact that the Indian troops are in a fully mobilised state for more than a month.

The Indo-Pak situation would come under focus during these visits.

Significantly, what India expects from Russia at this hour of crisis in terms of military hardware requirements will be high on the agenda during talks with Mr Klebanov who also heads the Russian side of an Inter-Governmental Commission on Military Technical Cooperation. The Indian side on this commission is headed by Defence Minister George Fernandes.

A meeting of this commission is also going to take place during Mr Klebanov’s visit. This commission meets once every six months. Mr Klebanov will be calling on President K.R. Narayanan and will be meeting Prime Minister Atal Behari Vajpayee and External Affairs Minister Jaswant Singh.

A senior official of the Ministry of External Affairs today confirmed that the issue of leasing of two nuclear submarines from Russia to India is going to come up during Mr Klebanov’s visit.

India would be pressing for the delivery of these nuclear submarines, which are ready, at the earliest. India at present does not have a single nuclear submarine. The only one it had, “INS Chakra”, was returned to Russia in 1991 after its lease expired.

Nuclear submarines are highly strategic weapons and can drastically alter the balance of power heavily in favour of India vis a vis Pakistan as Islamabad has never had a nuclear submarine in its arsenal. A nuclear submarine can traverse much greater distances and can remain underwater for months as compared to the conventional ones.

The MEA official also confirmed that there would be no problem pertaining to trained crew members of nuclear submarines because the Indo-Russia defence cooperation also included training of Indian submariners in handling nuclear submarines.