BJP DELEGATIONWITNESSED DEVELOPMENT WITHOUT PREJUDICE IN NORTH:BASIL

The Bharathiya Janatha Party (BJP) delegation from India that visited Sri Lanka recently stated that they witnessed mega development projects in the Northern Province which they said had been conducted without racial prejudice and had said that they would inform the Indian government and its people of this fact, the Economic Development Ministry said yesterday.

Shri Ravi Shankar Prasad of the Bharathiya Janatha Party (BJP), during a meeting with Minister Basil Rajapaksa last week, stated that the delegation headed by him would make a conscious effort to erase the misconception created in India as a result of certain misinterpretations made on Sri Lanka, the ministry said.

“He was of the opinion that it was imperative that stronger and uninterrupted economic co-operation was maintained between Sri Lanka and India. The Bharathiya Ja- natha Party had said that the two governments alone could not erase the existing misconceptions about Sri Lanka, but that it had to be a combined effort by the people of both countries,” the ministry said.

The BJP representatives expressed the view that people of both countries should make a combined effort to ensure that economic, political and cultural relations between the two countried continues to grow. “There is no ambiguity with regard to the development efforts taking place in the North and East of Sri Lanka. Certain protests against Sri Lanka launched in India are carried out by a small section of the country in which the whole of India has no hand, the group had emphasized.

During the meeting Minister Rajapaksa had stated that a host of development projects were being implemented for the benefit of the people of the North and assured that all communities in the country would be treated equally.