Indo-Pak anti-terror mechanism should be scrapped: BJP
The BJP on Tuesday demanded scrapping of the joint anti-terror mechanism between the two countries.
VARANASI: Charging Pakistan with consistently supporting terrorist outfits carrying out subversive acts to destabilise India, the BJP on Tuesday demanded scrapping of the joint anti-terror mechanism between the two countries.
"The UPA government should reconsider the joint anti-terror mechanism to which Prime Minister Manmohan Singh had agreed with Pakistan President Pervez Musharraf at Havana. The government should scrap the pact with Islamabad on the issue as its has been proved beyond doubt that the neighbouring country has been consistently supporting terrorist elements which are out to destabilise us", he said.
"Pakistan cannot not be trusted to deal with terrorist elements operating from its soil as it has been conclusively proved that Inter Services Intelligence was behind the Mumbai train blasts and other terror attacks across the country", Singh said.
"The UPA government should, on the other hand, make efforts for launching a diplomatic offensive to have Pakistan declared as a terrorist and rogue state in view of its anti-India tirade and support to terrorist elements operating against our country", the BJP President said.
Referring to former Defence Miniser Pranab Mukherjee's remark that terrorist elements had infiltrated into the armed forces, Singh asked the government to put in place a mechanism to root out such elements "so that our internal and external security is not jeopardised".
Singh hit out at the UPA government for its alleged minority appeasement policy and said that the delay in the execution of the parliament attack case convict Afzal Guru and the controversy over the singing of the national song Vande Mataram reflected its lack of will to ensure compliance of the law of the land.
The government gave in to its minority appeasement policy by making the singing of Vande Mataram by all citizens voluntary and not compulsory, while Jammu and Kasmir Chief Minister Gulam Nabi Azad and the former chief minister Farooq Abdullah came out in open support for the convict in the attack case by saying that Guru should not be hanged as it could have serious repercussions in the state, he said.
He also attacked the government for proposing for exempting the minority-run academic institutions from implementation of the reservation for the SC/ST and OBCs and said the reservation policy which has been mandated by our constitution be implemented in all academic institutions irrespective of whether they are run by the government or minority communities.
On measures against terrorism, Singh demanded enactment of a stringent legislation on the lines of the deleted prevention of terrorism act (Pota) for sternly dealing with the terrorist and subversive elements in the country.
Claiming that the terrorist activities had escalated after the UPA government scrapped Pota two years ago, Singh said if the government had problems with the words like Pota then it should consider some other name and come up with a legislation to deal effectively with terrorism.
He flayed the government for price rise and inflation and said that the country had witnessed escalation in the prices of all commodities after the Congress-led government came to power at the Centre.
Describing the hike in the prices of petro products, Singh said the common man had been burdened with increasing cost of life as every petro products price hike had had adverse impact on the prices of all commodities.