"Are we trying to help or hurt Kulbhushan Jadhav?"

The Congress party, while criticising Pakistan for this, also chose to politicise the matter.

The humiliating treatment meted out to Kulbhushan Jadhav's mother and wife when they visited Pakistan to meet him has sent political temperature soaring in India. The BJP spokespersons, almost on all TV channels yesterday, went all guns blazing on Pakistan for asking Jadhav's wife to remove her bindi and mangalsutra before the meeting. Some even dubbed it as an attack on Indian ethos and culture.

The Congress party, while criticising Pakistan for this, also chose to politicise the matter. Senior Congress leader Manish Tewari wrote on his Twitter handle that "India should have anticipated this chicanery."

"Are we trying to help or hurt Kulbhushan Jadhav.?Yes the meeting was deliberately botched by Pakistan.They behaved like imbecile's. India should have anticipated this chicanery.However an Indian is in their illegal custody. Our first priority is to bring him home SAFE.Sober up," Tewari's tweet read.

Tewari's another tweet this morning read that India may find itself isolated by the time "NDA govt's tenure comes to an end". He seemed to hint that the BJP-led government's was failing on the foreign policy front as China's influence was growing in the region.

Senior Congress leader and former external affairs minister Salman Khurshid said that "better" was expected from Pakistan and dubbed the entire episode of Jadhav's family visit to Pakistan as "very grave".

"It's a good thing that the family of Jadhav at least got to see him once. On the other hand, looking at it dispassionately I would believe that it's somewhat distressing and disturbing that an access given to a family should not be conducted in this deplorable manner, in which Pakistan has conducted it. They did not need to do this business of security and putting up conditions," Khurshid told ANI.

BJP's Subramanian Swamy said "serious homework" for the war should begin "right now".

"Whatever treatment was given to the mother and wife of Kulbhushan (Jadhav) is akin to Draupadi's vastraharan that resulted in Mahabharata," he said.

Kulbhushan Jadhav has been in a Pakistani jail since April 2016 over allegations of being an Indian spy. On what Pakistan claimed was a humanitarian gesture, Jadhav's mother and wife were issued visas and allowed to meet him on Monday. The meeting did not turn out to be the way Jadhav's family may have expected. There was a glass partition between Jadhav and his family, and his wife and the mother were asked to remove mangalsutra, bangles and bindi, besides having been asked to change the attire, citing it as a security measure.

The Ministry of External Affairs (MEA) on Tuesday lashed out at Pakistan for the way Jadhav's wife and mother were treated during the meeting.

MEA spokesperson Raveesh Kumar said, "The manner in which the meeting was conducted and its aftermath was clearly an attempt to bolster a false and unsubstantiated narrative of Jadhav's alleged activities. You would all agree that this exercise lacked any credibility...For some inexplicable reason, despite her repeated requests, the shoes of the wife of Shri Jadhav were not returned to her after the meeting. We would caution against any mischievous intent in this regard."

OneIndia News