Jammu: Senior BJP leader Devender Singh Rana on Friday slammed the People’s Alliance for Gupkar Declaration (PAGD) for stressing on holding a dialogue with Pakistan and asked it to refrain from overstepping into a domain, which is purely a central subject.
Reacting to the “unsolicited and uncalled for advice” of former chief minister Mehbooba Mufti over the need for India-Pakistan talks to restore normalcy in Jammu and Kashmir, he said, “Talks and terror cannot go together.”
Mufti is one of the leaders who have been asking the Centre to initiate a dialogue with the neighbouring country to restore peace in the union territory, especially Kashmir.
“How can our country engage in a dialogue with a rogue country,” Rana said, adding that Mufti herself had termed Pakistan “a failed country, responsible for sponsoring terrorism in Kashmir”.
“The PAGD leaders must shun double standards and call a spade a spade, whether in the government or outside,” he said.
Rana took strong exception to Mufti’s assertion about the Kashmir issue being on the agenda of the United Nations.
The BJP leader said he regretted the desperate attempts of the PAGD leadership to indulge in “soft separatism”.
“It is all the more sad when those having held constitutional positions play to the galleries to create a narrative, impregnated with communal overtones,” he said.
“The people of Jammu and Kashmir are not going to buy their motivated apprehensions, as they know such gimmicks are part of carving out a lost space in the political spectrum and to be relevant in Kashmir politics,” he alleged.
Rana said the people of Jammu and Kashmir, especially in the Valley, were elated over the “fast-improving” situation in the union territory and claimed that economic activities and tourism had begun gaining momentum.
“If all this is not visible to the peace-breakers, they are betraying their tall claims of having a connect with the people’’, Rana said, adding that the normalised Kashmir was a source of discomfort to them.
He said the people of Jammu and Kashmir, too, had the right to progress and prosper.
—PTI
PAGD should stay away: BJP leader on Mufti’s advice for Indo-Pak talks added by Press Trust of India on
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