The Congress said on Monday that the Union government was sending out confusing signals on Kashmir.
Party spokesperson Manish Tewari said that a day after Union Finance Minister Arun Jaitley took a hard line on the continuing crisis in the Valley, Prime Minister Narendra Modi, while meeting a delegation of Opposition parties from the State, emphasised need for dialogue to find a “permanent and lasting solution”.
Underscoring the seriousness of the crisis in the Valley, where curfew has been imposed in various places for a month- and-a-half, Mr. Tewari said that if the government came up with a workable road map, the Opposition would cooperate with it.
“Instead, we are getting mere empty rhetoric from the Prime Minister. He talks of Insaniyat [humanity], Jamhooriyat [democracy] and Kashmiriyat [Kashmiri identity/essence], but does he know what these words mean,” he said.
“The Finance Minister should explain the contradictions between what he is saying and what the Prime Minister is saying.The FM is suggesting that the only problem in Kashmir is the lack of development,” he said.
Mr. Tewari wanted to know whom Mr. Modi wished to have a dialogue with, as he has already had a conversation with mainstream political parties. Did he intend to talk to those not in the mainstream, he asked.
Returning to the controversial Balochistan issue, Mr. Tewari, on behalf of his party, supported the Prime Minister’s stand on the subject.
“When the Sharm el-Sheikh statement was made in 2009 [during the tenure of the UPA government], the BJP said India should not be seen interfering in the affairs of another country,” he said.
