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PM's headaches don't go away while on vacation

George Iype in Kumarakom

The anti-India riots sweeping through Nepal, lashing rains and mild tremors are playing spoilsport with the weeklong vacation of Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee at the lake resort of Kumarakom in Kerala.

Vajpayee is being briefed every hour on the violent protests in Nepal by his temporary office set up at the Taj Garden Retreat in Kumarakom.

On Friday morning, Vajpayee spoke to Home Minister L K Advani at length on the unrest in Nepal, and the two are believed to have discussed a series of steps to ensure that the protests do not mar bilateral relations.

Officials said it is unclear as of now what steps the Vajpayee government would take to ensure that the crisis does not snowball into a major diplomatic row between the two neighbours.

Though India has not officially blamed Pakistan for triggering the violence in Kathmandu, the Vajpayee government suspects Pakistan's Inter-Services Intelligence to be behind the anti-India riots, say officials.

While the crisis in Nepal has been eating into the prime minister's vacation, the weather gods have not been too kind either.

Occasional rains and high speed winds have confined the prime minister indoors. The met office has forecast rains over the next 48 hours, and adding to the weather problems are the mild tremors that central Kerala has been experiencing for the last two weeks.

Though a mild tremor measuring 2.5 on the Richter Scale has been predicted in parts of Kerala over the next few days, police officials said it is not expected to pose a problem for the prime minister.

The downside is that the prime minister's proposed ride in a houseboat, specially brought into Kumarakom by the Kerala Tourism Department, will depend on clear skies.

Apart from this, Vajpayee's family members -- adopted daughter Namita, her husband Ranjan Bhattacharya and their daughter -- are expected to visit the famous Chottanikara temple near Kochi, to offer prayers for Bhattacharya who on Thursday night celebrated a quiet birthday with Vajpayee and other officials at the Taj Garden Retreat.

The full coverage of Vajpayee's vacation

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