The Hindu : Govt. helpless, says Opposition

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Wednesday, Jul 17, 2002

National

National

Govt. helpless, says Opposition

By Our Special Correspondent

NEW DELHI JULY 16. The Government today came under sustained attack from the Opposition, which charged that it had been watching helplessly even as innocent lives were being lost at the hands of terrorists in Jammu and Kashmir.

On October 1 last year the Jammu and Kashmir Assembly was attacked, on December 13 Parliament was the target of terrorists, then there was the Kaluchak massacre in May and now the Rajiv Nagar killings in which 28 men, women and children had died. But still, the Government had failed to come up with a coherent plan.

Shivraj Patil (Congress), who moved the adjournment motion on the Jammu killings, and Somnath Chatterji (CPI-M) led the charge. Both pointed out that each time the terrorists strike with impunity, the Government rushes to blame Pakistan and then tell the western powers: look what Pakistan is doing. "We are exposing our weakness, our inability to tackle the problem,'' Mr. Patil said. "Are we not trying to shun away from our own responsibility to protect the people?''

Mr. Chatterji said the Government had presented the Prevention of Terrorism Act as the answer to tackling terrorism. But where was POTA now? "Its only visible sign was the absence of Vaiko (the MDMK leader)'', he said. The Government had talked about a ''proactive policy'' but the result was a "monumental failure'' which was there for all to see.

The Samajwadi Party leader, Mulayam Singh Yadav, described the terror strike at Rajiv Nagar as an attempt to spread panic and whip up tensions. He wanted the Government to demonstrate that it was in a position to root out terrorism on its own, not depending on the United States to pressure Pakistan.

The Prime Minister had said after the Kaluchak massacre that the battle against terrorism would be decisive, but what has happened now? The Government had even failed to apprehend the terrorists. "I strongly condemn such a useless, incompetent and weak Government,'' he said.

Even friend and supporter of the Government, K. Yerrannaidu of the TDP, wanted to know whether terrorism against the U.S. was different from terrorism against Indians. While he supported the Government, he did want it to take some "drastic step'' to ensure security of the people.

P.H. Pandian of the AIADMK urged the Centre to maintain surveillance over the terrorists operating in Jammu and Kashmir to avoid recurrence of such incidents.

Margaret Alva of the Congress asked, "What is the strategy of the Government? Short-term or long-term, please spell it out. Even after shuffling and reshuffling, it is the same old story. Is the Government gone into some kind of atrophy, a paralysis?''The final blow came from Raghuvansh Prasad Singh (RJD) who demanded resignation of the Deputy Prime Minister and Home Minister, L.K. Advani, for the failure to effectively deal with terrorism.

Printer friendly page
Send this article to Friends by E-Mail

National