The Congress on Wednesday launched a sharp attack on Prime Minister Narendra Modi over the developments in Jammu & Kashmir and demanded to know the steps he planned to take ensure peace and normacly in the state.
A day after Congress president Rahul Gandhi accused the BJP of setting the state on fire, former prime minister Manmohan Singh chaired a meeting of the AICC policy planning group on J&K that has senior leaders P Chidambaram, Ghulam Nabi Azad, Ambika Soni among others.
“The directionless, agenda-less and clueless policy of the Modi government has left the people of Jammu and Kashmir in complete despair and this is a grave national concern,” Azad and Soni said in a statement after the meeting held at the direction of Congress president Rahul Gandhi.
The Congress did not favour immediate Assembly elections in the state arguing that the security situation needed to be stabilised first.
“How does Prime Minister Modi propose to ensure peace and normalcy in the state’ What is the economic roadmap for inclusion and progress for the people of Jammu and Kashmir’ How does the Central Government propose to prevent the radicalization of J&K’s youth'” the Congress asked.
The party also demanded to know as to how does the Modi government propose to engage with various sections of the state “in order to win their hearts and minds”.
Azad termed the the coming together of the BJP and the PDP to form a coalition government in the state in 2015 as “Faustian deal”.
“The BJP and the PDP share equal blame for undoing all the progress towards normalcy achieved during the UPA government,” Azad said.
Asked whether the Congress had not entered a similar “Faustian deal” with the JD(S) in Karnataka, Azad defended the coalition government headed by Chief Minister H D Kumaraswamy.
“JD(S) and Congress are both secular parties. We are not ideological opposites such as the BJP and the PDP,” Azad said.