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A Much 'Roving' Ambassador

Faux pas galore, merry-going-round with women, absenteeism marked his Zagreb stint

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A Much 'Roving' Ambassador
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Duska Bilic, who worked briefly as a housekeeper at Mathrani’s residence but quit because of his behaviour

"This ambassador didn't get any values from his parents, I think," surmises Bilic, a highly educated woman whose husband is a physicist at Croatia's most prestigious institute. Like countless professionals in former East Bloc countries, Bilic and her husband need the extra income because government salaries are simply not enough to buy medical insurance and food. "Can you imagine Mathrani didn't even pay me fully for my work when he wasted so much of government money? And he comes from a country of millions of poor people?" she asks, her eyes flashing. She recounts incidents involving Mathrani and how he made unwelcome advances on some women and how badly he treated his Indian maid. He often left her without money as he disappeared with his girl friends. Bilic gave the Indian maid her old cellphone and shoes so she wouldn't have to walk in the snow in plastic slippers. "I can't believe he comes from the country of Mahatma Gandhi, a country that was colonised. He behaved worse than the colonisers," says Bilic, who can hold forth on topics ranging from globalisation to Kurt Vonnegut Jr.

But once he saw the ghost of the Volcker report, Mathrani began a desperate clean-up operation. He asked his assistant to get all records of his phone and hotel bills and even asked how long local hotels keep their records on individual guests. He asked last month that fake invitations be procured from various mayors of towns he had cavorted in earlier this year with women to make the romps look like "official business".

If his personal conduct sank below inexcusable levels, his official conduct swerved between clueless and crass. He also used the taxpayers' money to live the seedy life without doing much real work, say those who watched him closely. He is known to have demanded freebies from local tourist offices such as boats and hospitality while romping through the Dalmatian coast this summer with his women friends. He denied Croatian executives visas unless the ceo came and paid a personal visit—a cheap powerplay hardly worthy of an ambassador of an important country like India.

It might even be said that Mathrani rarely put a foot right in his dealings with the host government. He upset and insulted the speaker of the Croatian parliament, Vladimir Seks, after the latter's son died in Goa. For no apparent reason, Mathrani arrived 15 minutes late for a meeting with the speaker. Seks dismissed him in five minutes, doing a tit for tat. Seks, known as a kingmaker, is one of the most influential politicians here.

Mathrani then made a serious faux pas—because he was so out of touch with the real world of diplomacy—and attended the Croatian 'victory' day which was shunned by the entire diplomatic corps save Iran and Egypt. The European Union ambassadors decided to send low-level diplomats to the September 5 celebrations to send a message to Croatia about human rights. The 'victory day' was seen as unseemly by most countries because the birth of Serbia and Croatia out of the former Yugoslavia was shadowed by war crimes against the Muslims. But Mathrani, oblivious and unaware, was right there beside the Iranian ambassador who attended for obvious reasons—Iran was desperate for support given the international pressure because of its nuclear programme.

But Mathrani was removed from his work because he was often not in Zagreb. He was either in New Delhi jockeying for a ministry every time there was talk of a cabinet reshuffle or holidaying in resort towns along the Dalmatian coast, say two sources who know him well. He often failed to inform the appropriate authorities. One such trip to New York this year resulted in his recall in April-May. The trip reportedly landed him on the wrong side of his former mentor Natwar Singh. Well-informed sources say that Mathrani's mysterious visit to New York in March without informing either the MEA or Natwar was the beginning of the end. Mathrani had just returned to Zagreb on the first Sunday in March after one of his frequent trips to Delhi. He forced the embassy staff to come to office on Sunday to meet him but for no apparent business. He left for New York the next day.

Relations between Natwar and Mathrani began souring rapidly and the former minister reportedly refused to take his calls. Sources say reasons could range from internal Congress party intrigues to the storm of the impending Volcker report but the two men began gunning for each other. What is crystal clear, however, is that Mathrani's conduct in Zagreb was reason enough for him to be removed with immediate effect.

Questions are being asked as to why the MEA failed to act. It appears that the ministry was either unable to forcefully intervene because of Mathrani's perceived power—he shamelessly boasted about his proximity to The Family—or it didn't know the full extent of his exploits. Sources say Mathrani had, on occasion, blocked reporting by embassy officers when he angered the host government or when he was lampooned in the local press. Croatia's most prominent newsweekly Globus asked loudly in a November 25 article if the Indian ambassador was using Croatia as a safe haven to escape the fallout from the Volcker report. The article questioned Mathrani's sudden fondness for Zagreb post-Volcker, given that he was rarely at his post before that. Local journalists say Mathrani projected himself as 'too important' to the ruling party to spend all his time in Croatia.

V. Mahalingam, counsellor and charge d' affaires at the Indian embassy in Zagreb, declined to discuss Mathrani, saying he could not comment on anyone's personal life. He also refused to comment on whether Mathrani actively prevented the MEA from seeing press coverage here and directed all questions to senior officials in New Delhi. So brazen was Mathrani that he even blocked the agre'ment of Rajiv Mishra, the ambassador-designate to Croatia, from being communicated to the Croatian foreign ministry in April after he himself had been recalled. Mishra, a career IFS officer and currently India's deputy ambassador to the WTO in Geneva, will have to launch a major repair operation when he finally arrives in Zagreb.

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