Mehbooba may meet PM today to discuss unrest in Kashmir

Jammu and Kashmir chief minister Mehbooba Mufti is likely to meet Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Monday to discuss the volatile situation in the Valley, amid growing demand from the Opposition for imposition of governor’s rule in the state.

The meeting, which PMO sources said is “possible”, also comes in the backdrop of tensions between the ruling alliance partners that escalated after last week’s elections to the legislative council brought the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) face-to-face with the BJP.

A cross vote by an Independent legislator from Zanaskar in Ladakh region helped the BJP trounce the PDP in a close finish. The PDP later accused the party of “betrayal” and “violating” the coalition dharma.

Mehbooba, who attended a NITI Aayog meeting in Delhi on Sunday, is also expected to meet home minister Rajnath Singh.

The Valley has been on the boil since the Lok Sabha bypolls in Srinagar on April 9, with clashes being witnessed between protesters and security forces.

During the meetings, Mehbooba will reiterate her demand for initiating a dialogue process with all stakeholders to restore peace in the state. The chief minister is also expected to raise the issue of assaults on some Kashmiri students in different parts of the country and an attack on a Muslim nomadic family, allegedly by VHP and Bajrang Dal activists in Jammu.

Meanwhile, upping its ante against the BJP, senior PDP leader and minister for education Altaf Bukhari issued a hard-hitting statement against the party’s pointsman on Kashmir, Ram Madhav, for his “everything is fair in love and war” statement.

“Is it a war declared against Kashmiris who, despite all odds, cast their votes reaffirming their belief in democracy? Or it is a war declared to satiate the sanguine electoral interests of a particular political party in the country?” Bukhari asked. The PDP minister said Madhav’s remarks had put pressure on the party, whose core constituency had eroded “significantly” due to “little action” on the ‘Agenda of the Alliance’ (AoA) by the BJP.

Days after doing away with stamping of baggage tags at seven metro airports, the Central Industrial Security Force (CISF) will include six other airports in the list from Monday.

The force will conduct a weeklong trial run at Chennai, Patna, Guwahati, Thiruvananthapuram, Jaipur and Lucknow airports from April 24-30.

“Before implementing permanently, we want to conduct a trial run so that if there are any security concerns, they can be addressed,” CISF director general (DG) OP Singh said.

From April 1, air travellers at Delhi and six other airports were asked not to get hand baggage tags stamped anymore.

In December, CISF had started trial runs for this but stamping was resumed after a week due to security concerns.

The Bureau Of Civil Aviation Security Office (BCAS) in February issued an order announcing that the procedure was to be done away with but the CISF had at that time objected to immediate implementation of the plan.

Following this, a joint meeting was held to iron out issues. “Appropriate measures have been taken. The cycle of security check will speed up and our staff will get more time to check suspicious baggage,” Singh added.

After the trial run, the move will be tried at other airports. The CISF provides security at 59 airports. During the previous trial run, the CISF found that stamping of baggage tags could be dispensed with after certain modifications of security architecture in security hold areas of the airports and installation of high definition CCTV cameras.

These modifications were required to make sure that passengers could not access bags containing restricted items which are segregated by the CISF personnel for checking.

CISF had collected the feedback during the one-week trial run. “In Bengaluru, 89% of the passengers appreciated the move, while 11% said stamps on tags bring a sense of security. In Delhi, over 2,400 flights were covered and in some cases, during random checks at boarding gates, few suspicious items were caught,” the official added.

THE CISF HAD STARTED TRIAL RUNS FOR THE MOVE IN DECEMBER BUT STAMPING WAS RESUMED AFTER A WEEK DUE TO SECURITY CONCERNS