A day after Union Home Minister Amit Shah’s statement on former PM Jawaharlal Nehru in Parliament, several political leaders hit out at the Home Minister and demanded a discussion in the House for the entire day saying that “get the PoK before 2024 elections.”
Blaming Jawaharlal Nehru for Pakistan occupying part of Jammu and Kashmir which belongs to India, Union Home Minister Amit Shah on Wednesday said that due to the “two blunders” of the former Prime Minister, Kashmir had to “suffer for years.”
On Union Home Minister Amit Shah’s statement regarding former PM Jawaharlal Nehru, Leader of Congress in Lok Sabha, Adhir Ranjan Chowdhury said that this matter should be discussed in the House for the entire day. This is not a small matter. It is not only Amit Shah who knows the history of India, there must be others too. So, people of the country would get to know.
“When Article 370 was scrapped in 2019, Amit Shah had said that PoK would be brought back. It has been 10 years since PM Modi came to power, Atal Bihari Vajpayee was in power for 6 years. So, who is stopping the BJP?…Get back PoK before 2024 elections. You will get all the votes of the entire India,” he added.
Meanwhile, National Conference (NC) President Farooq Abdullah said that a date would be given for elections but when the speech was over no date was given.
“He said that a date would be given for elections but when the speech was over no date was given. We regret this. Our demand is that elections should be held,” Abdullah said.
PDP chief Mehbooba Mufti said that if Amit Shah was really serious about Kashmiri Pandits, he would have reserved seats here instead of nomination.
“If he (Amit Shah) was really serious about Kashmiri Pandits, he would have reserved seats here instead of nomination… Our Kashmiri Pandit people used to win elections from Kashmir… If they were serious about bringing back Kashmiri Pandits then this was a golden opportunit,” she added.
AAP MP Sushil Gupta said that it is easy to make allegations about other people’s work.
“Jammu and Kashmir was made a Union Territory for a limited time to end terrorism, but until now, neither terrorism has ended nor the status of statehood has been restored,” Gupta said.
Moreover, Janata Dal (United) MP Sunil Kumar Pintu said that it is right that mistakes have happened in the past, and as a result, we can see that PoK is being illegally occupied by some other country today. “The person responsible for it is the Prime Minister of that time,” he said.
Shiv Sena (UBT) MP Arvind Sawant said that before coming to power, BJP were saying the same thing. They are experts in setting narratives of patriotic illusions without doing anything.
“So many soldiers are being killed, police officers are being continuously killed in Kashmir. Abrogation of 370 miserably failed… So instead of giving the proper answer to these issues, they’ll create other illusions… Kindly maintain the peace first and restore the democracy in Jammu and Kashmir,” he said.
However, RJD MP Manoj Jha suggested “BJP to read the letters of Syama Prasad Mookerjee, look at the last phase of Mahadev Desai”.
“You will get to know everything. I believe that if you are so scared of Nehru, even today, you should set up the Ministry of Jawaharlal Nehru and have a 12-hour-long discussion about him one day. The reality will be out,” he added.
While replying to a debate on the Jammu and Kashmir Reservation (Amendment) Bill, 2023 and Jammu and Kashmir Reorganisation (Amendment) Bill, 2023 in Lok Sabha, Shah noted that Nehru made “two blunders”– declared a ceasefire without winning the entire Kashmir (during India-Pakistan war in 1948) and also took the Kashmir issue to the United Nations.
Shah asserted that if Nehru had taken the right steps, PoK would be an integral part of India today.
“I support the word that was used here — Nehruvian blunder. Because of the blunder that was committed during the time of Nehru, Kashmir had to suffer. With responsibility, I want to say that the two blunders that happened during the tenure of Jawaharlal Nehru, due to his decisions, because of which Kashmir had to suffer for years. The first is to declare a ceasefire – when our army was winning, the ceasefire was imposed. If there had been a ceasefire after three days, PoK would have been a part of India today…The second is to take our internal issue to the UN,” Shah said.
During the debate, the Home Minister also said that the root cause of terrorism in the region was nothing but Article 370, which was abrogated by the Prime Minister Narendra Modi-led government in 2019.
“During the 1994-2004 period, a total of 40,164 incidents of terrorism were registered. During the 2004-2014 period, a total of 7,217 incidents of terrorism took place. During the 2014-2023 period, under the Narendra Modi government, the total incidents of terrorism registered have been around 2,000, which marks a 70 per cent reduction in the incidents of terrorism. That is why I was right in saying that the root cause of separatism, the root cause of terrorism was nothing but Article 370,” he said.
The Home Minister, during his address in the lower house, reaffirmed that Pakistan-occupied Kashmir is part of the country. (ANI)
