Shah pitches J&K move as poll issue in Mumbai
MUMBAI: Home minister Amit Shah said on Sunday the move to revoke the special status of Jammu and Kashmir was a nationalistic decision taken by the Narendra Modi-led government, even as he appeared to pitch the issue as a referendum for the party’s popularity in the upcoming Maharashtra assembly elections.
Addressing an election campaign rally in Mumbai, the Union minister also hit out at the opposition Congress, accusing it of politicising the Centre’s August move to effectively revoke Article 370 of the Constitution on an issue that involved “national security”.
“I am happy that the campaign for the state polls is beginning with the discussion on our decision to remove Articles 370 and 35(A),” Shah told the rally in suburban Goregaon, where he launched the party’s poll campaign.
The state, which goes to polls on October 21 in a single phase, is ruled by the BJP in an alliance with the Shiv Sena. Results for the elections to the 288-member Maharashtra assembly will be declared on October 24.
Shortly after coming to power for a second term after the 2019 Lok Sabha elections, the Modi government moved to abrogate provisions of Article 370, which gave special status to J&K, and bifurcate the state into two Union Territories – Jammu and Kashmir, and Ladakh.
“The Congress views it as political issue, but we consider this as nationalism,” Shah said at the BJP’S ‘Jan Sampark Abhiyaan’ rally over the Kashmir move and to campaign for his party ahead of next month’s assembly polls in Maharashtra.
The BJP president also reaffirmed that incumbent chief
minister Devendra Fadnavis will be the party’s choice for the top post for a second term.
In 2014, Fadnavis became the first politician from the BJP to become the chief minister of Maharashtra; the saffron party had been the junior partner to the Sena earlier.
While defending the scrapping of J&K’S special status, Shah asked BJP workers to make the electorate aware of this move, signalling that the issue will be a poll plank for the BJP-SHIV Sena government in Maharashtra.
“The BJP workers should go to every household and explain about the scrapping of Article 370. It was done to integrate Kashmir into India,” he said, appealing to voters to defeat the Congress and the Nationalist Congress Party (NCP) for opposing the Centre’s move.
He also called upon NCP chief Sharad Pawar and Congress leader Rahul Gandhi to clarify their stands on Article 370 and rebutted the allegation that changes in the status of J&K will lead to bloodshed in Kashmir.
“Right from August 5, not a single bullet has been fired, not anyone has been killed till date,” the home minister said.
“I want to inform Rahul Gandhi that our three generations have struggled to strike down Article 370. So, it is not some political issue like you may believe. Keeping it alive was a political issue for the Congress, but for the BJP it was a matter of the country’s unity and integrity, a dream made true by PM Modi,” Shah said.
Shah further accused former prime minister Jawaharlal Nehru for agreeing to an “untimely ceasefire” in 1947, which he said paved the way for the creation of Pakistan-occupied Kashmir (POK).
Shah’s statement comes days after the external affairs minister S Jaishankar said POK is part of India and the country expects to have “physical jurisdiction” over the region one day.
Defence minister Rajnath Singh on Sunday said that talks with Pakistan cannot be resumed until Islamabad stops “exporting terrorism” to India, and added that any future discussion will be held on POK.
The BJP’S ally, Shiv Sena, said that the focus should be on pressing issues facing Maharashtra. “The Sena has always stood for the scrapping of Article 370, but then that chapter is done with. We should focus on issues such as agrarian crisis, unemployment and industrial issues,” the party’s spokesperson Manisha Kayande said.
While Shah did not mention the Uddhav Thackeray-led Shiv Sena in his speech on Sunday, he talked about the National Democratic Alliance winning a three-fourth majority in the upcoming elections.
The Congress on Sunday termed Shah’s speech as a “diversionary tactic”, with party general secretary and spokesperson Sachin Sawant saying in a statement: “I would like to remind Shah that the election is of Maharashtra and not of Jammu and Kashmir. If he wishes to talk about Article 370, he should visit J-K for the same.”
NCP leader Ajit Pawar dismissed that Kashmir was an election issue. “The electorate is concerned about the day-to-day issues such as agrarian crisis and the lack of employment, and not Kashmir,” said Pawar.
WHILE DEFENDING THE SCRAPPING OF J&K’S SPECIAL STATUS, SHAH ASKED BJP WORKERS TO MAKE THE ELECTORATE AWARE OF THIS MOVE