During a 20-minute conversation between US president Bill Clinton and Prime Minister A B Vajpayee at around 7 pm (IST), Vajpayee told his counterpart that irrespective of the government in power in Pakistan, India was ready to have ``friendly relations'' with its neighbour.

The call from White House was essentially to congratulate Vajpayee on his appointment as the Prime Minister of India.

It comes in the wake of the US decision that Bruce Riedel, the official in the US administration who was supposed to have visited Pakistan, India and Bangladesh this week, will now be cancelling the Islamabad leg of his tour. Riedel, along with senior advisor in the USState Department Mathew Daley, now arrive in Delhi on Sunday night.

Since one of the items on top of the Riedel-Daley agenda was to discuss the Clinton visit, the cancellation of the Pakistani tour indicates that a rescheduling of the capitals to be visited may well be on the cards.

According to highly placed sources in the government, who described the telephone conversation between the two leaders tonight as a ``very good talk,'' Vajpayee told Clinton that Pakistan must ``demonstrate in a substantial manner'' its good intentions of dealing with India. The end to Pakistan-sponsored terrorism would be a good beginning.

New Delhi, which feels it must adopt a ``pragmatic'' approach on dealing with Islamabad, is closely watching Gen. Musharraf, who has vested sweeping powers in his hands in the last 72 hours.

It believes that Musharraf continues to be hand-in-glove with the fundamentalist Taliban regime. And that this convergence of interest between the two is encouraging insurgency in Jammu &Kashmir.

Government sources said that if Pakistan's new rulers were now prepared to end terrorism, New Delhi was ``prepared to sit down and talk'' to them. But that in the changed circumstances, the old bilateral composite dialogue was not enough. ``It has to now be more than the composite agenda. The basis for dialogue will have to be re-established,'' the sources said. ``They (the army) are not going to talk about Lahore any more,'' the sources added, pointing out that that particular peace process was effectively dead for the moment.

Meanwhile, the US President, in a letter of congratulations to Vajpayee yesterday, stressed upon the institutions of democracy that govern both nations. Today, he is believed to have referred to the fact that the ``tension'' in South Asia should give way to ``peace'' in the region.

``You and I,'' said Clinton to Vajpayee in the letter, pointing out that they were the leaders of the world's largest democracies, ``have a special responsibility to demonstrate that democracyprovides the best foundation for not only domestic prosperity and stability but for cooperation and harmony among democratic nations.''

The MEA shed its 72-hour-old inhibitions on that score today, describing the events in Islamabad as a ``military coup.'' The spokesman said Pakistan was ``effectively under martial law'' and that India had ``concerns about the direction in which the situation is moving.''