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Tough for PM to attend SAARC
summit: Mishra

If, as agreed to, the ideas put forward in Kathmandu during the SAARC ministerial-level meeting were implemented by December-end, "we could consider it", he said.

In an interview to Tim Sebastian on BBC World's 'Hard Talk' programme to be aired on Thursday, Mishra made it clear that India was prepared to restart negotiations with Pakistan if it honoured its pledge to end cross-border terrorism.

However, Pakistan had done nothing in this regard, he added.

The prime minister's top aide admitted that India and Pakistan were "pretty close" to war in January following the attack on Parliament and also in May this year in the wake of the terrorist strike on an army transit camp in Jammu where families of soldiers were living.

Mishra dismissed the suggestion that political or electoral considerations would ever arise in the prime minister's mind if it were a question of going to war.

He was asked about Vishwa Hindu Parishad leader Ashok Singhal's reported remarks that any Indian prime minister who took action against Pakistan would sweep the elections.

While contending that there was no pressure on the government to go to war, he said "emotions were very high" after the attacks on Parliament and the army camp.

He, however, felt that there was no danger today of a "little spark, creating a conflagration... but, of course, if something big were to happen obviously..."

Mishra said there was a vast constituency in India that wanted resolution of all issues through dialogue.

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