New Delhi: External Affairs Minister S. Jaishankar on Thursday hit back at the opposition's criticism of his meeting with US Secretary of State Marco Rubio in Mumbai, arguing that Indian leaders have routinely met foreign counterparts outside the national capital — including Congress's own icons — and asking whether those meetings would also be described as "summoning".
Speaking at the NDTV World Summit, Jaishankar said he was genuinely unable to understand the controversy over the venue of his talks with Rubio, which Congress leader Rahul Gandhi had sarcastically described as the American official summoning the Indian minister. He dismissed the jibe with characteristic bluntness, urging what he called an "adult conversation" on foreign policy.
"I failed to get it," the minister said, drawing applause from the audience at the summit. "They don't like Mumbai. They have something against Mumbai. It's our financial capital. It's our Bollywood capital. It has got so much going for it. Maybe Mumbai doesn't like them. I have no idea. Why they have this reservation."
Jaishankar, a 71-year-old former diplomat who has served as India's foreign secretary before entering politics, said he could list many examples of leaders travelling outside Delhi to meet visiting foreign dignitaries. He reached directly for two episodes involving the Congress party itself to make his point.
"If going out of Delhi to meet a foreign leader or a foreign counterpart is summoning, I can give you a lot of examples. Mrs Gandhi went to Shimla to meet Bhutto. Was she summoned? Salman Khurshid went to Jaipur to meet a Pakistan PM. Was he summoned?" he asked.
The references were pointed. In July 1972, then Prime Minister Indira Gandhi met Pakistan's then President Zulfikar Ali Bhutto in Shimla, where the two leaders signed the historic Shimla Agreement in the aftermath of the 1971 war — one of the most significant diplomatic moments in independent India's history.
In March 2013, Salman Khurshid, who served as external affairs minister in the Manmohan Singh-led UPA government, hosted Pakistan Prime Minister Raja Pervez Ashraf over lunch in Jaipur during the latter's private visit to the country.
"We are adults, let's have an adult conversation. Let's leave, you know," Jaishankar said, taking a swipe at the Congress leadership as the audience clapped.
The minister's remarks came after Rahul Gandhi's October 16 post, which followed comments by US Ambassador Sergio Gor indicating that Jaishankar would travel to Mumbai to meet Rubio. In his post, Gandhi said Rubio had summoned "his employee" to the city and claimed officials in the Indian foreign ministry were confused about the arrangement.
The US Mission in India, in a statement on Thursday, said that Secretary Rubio visited Mumbai and Jamnagar from October 20 to 22 to "advance the US-India strategic partnership, strengthen commercial and investment ties, and reaffirm the United States' commitment to a prosperous and secure Indo-Pacific".
The statement added that Rubio participated in a Freedom 250 reception as the guest of honour, commemorating the 250th anniversary of American independence and celebrating the enduring bonds between the American and Indian people.
Jaishankar hosted counterparts from the United Arab Emirates and the United States in Mumbai on October 19 and 20, and also attended the celebrations marking the 250th anniversary of US independence as a guest of honour.
The external affairs ministry had already moved last week to dismiss criticism of the Mumbai venue. MEA spokesperson Randhir Jaiswal said at a media briefing that hosting foreign dignitaries outside the national capital was a decade-long practice.
He cited Prime Minister Narendra Modi hosting the Spanish prime minister in Vadodara and the German chancellor in Ahmedabad, and Jaishankar himself hosting the Heart of Asia Conference in Amritsar, to underscore that such engagements are an established part of Indian diplomacy. According to ThePrint's account of the briefing, the planned agenda for the Rubio talks covered bilateral ties, energy, trade, investment and defence.
Jaishankar's own account of the meeting, posted on October 20, described the talks as covering regional issues and people-to-people ties, alongside cooperation on defence, technology, energy and trade.
The political exchange reflects the sharp edge that foreign policy has acquired in India's domestic debate. Jaishankar's decision to invoke Indira Gandhi's legacy is notable because the Congress has long claimed her 1972 diplomacy with Pakistan as one of its proudest foreign policy achievements. By framing the Mumbai meeting in that lineage, the minister sought to turn the opposition's criticism back on itself.
It is also not the first time that Jaishankar has directly rebutted claims about India's engagement with the Trump-era US administration. The minister has repeatedly pushed back against characterisations of India as reactive in its dealings with Washington, insisting that New Delhi conducts its foreign policy on its own terms.
The broader context of the Rubio visit is the ongoing recalibration of the US-India relationship, with trade, energy and defence cooperation high on the bilateral agenda. India and the United States have been navigating a complex phase in ties, with both sides seeking to expand commercial engagement even as they manage differences over tariffs and regional issues.
For the moment, though, the minister's focus was firmly on the domestic political argument. Rejecting the notion that meeting an American secretary of state outside Delhi amounted to subservience, Jaishankar argued that the venue was a matter of diplomatic convention, not deference. His parting advice to his critics — that they engage in an "adult conversation" — captured a minister who believes India's foreign policy debates should be conducted on facts rather than slogans.
Whether the opposition accepts that framing remains to be seen. But with the Mumbai meeting now over and its official agenda described in detail, the argument over its location may prove to be a shorter controversy than the diplomatic substance that emerges from the talks themselves.
The Jaishankar-Rubio discussions, officials on both sides suggest, will feed into a series of follow-on engagements between New Delhi and Washington in the months ahead — with trade and defence at the top of the list.
(Reporting based on NDTV and Hindustan Times.)