25 January,2011 07:53 AM IST | | Surender Sharma
Kashmiri Pandits say that by stopping the BJP's Rashtriya Ekta Yatra, Centre and state governments have submitted themselves to the wishes of bullies
After senior leaders of the Bharatiya Janata Party Arun Jaitley and Sushma Swaraj were prevented from entering the city of Jammu in support of the party's Rashtriya Ekta Yatra and asked to return to Delhi, Kashmiri Pandits have strongly deplored the state government's move.
Power trip: Anurag Thakur, BJYM President, waves to supporters in Delhi
during his Rashtriya Ekta Yatra on Thursday. PIC/Rajeev Tyagi
"I am not surprised at the response of Central and Jammu and Kashmir governments. They have been behaving this way all the while. They have submitted themselves to the wishes of bullies," said Sushil Pandit, a representative of Roots in Kashmir (an organisation ofu00a0 Kahmiri Pandits).u00a0 "Kashmir is an integral part of India. If people are not allowed to hoist national flag in Kashmir, will they go to Islamabad for that," Pandit added.
u00a0
Jammu- based convenor of Panun Kashmir,u00a0 Agnishekhar said, "This is not opposition to BJP but to the very act of hoisting the national flag in Kashmir. Had the flag been in the hand of Sonia Gandhi, Lalu Prasad Yadav or Nitish Kumar, the reaction would have been the same.u00a0 The incident has shown that the normalcy has not returned to Kashmir as claimed by the Central and Jammu and Kashmir governments. We knew it and now whole country and world has come to know of it,' he said.
The leader said that it was an irony that when Arundhati Roy, Yasin Malik and SAS Geelani talk ofu00a0 breaking this country into pieces, nothing happens to them. But when somebody plan to hoist the flag, he is prevented from doing so," said the leader.
Meanwhile, 'Roots in Kashmir' boycotted a meeting called by the Home Ministry in Delhi on Monday in protest against Jammu incident. "The Home Ministry had invited us for meeting on security concerns of Kashmiri Pandits after terror threats. We did not attend it in protest of the Ministry's stand against hoisting of national flag at the Lal Chowk," said Aditya Raj Kaul of the organisation.
| Playing it safe |
| With BJP showing no signs of going back on its plan to hoist the national flag at Srinagar's Lal Chowk on January 26, nearly 5,000 security personnel have been deployed along the state's border with Punjab. Police and CRPF personnel are manning all entry points into the state. Two women platoons have also been deployed keeping in view the presence of women activists, a police official said. "Riot control vehicles, water cannons and deployment of companies of CRPF and police has been done at all entry points from Punjab into J and K," the official added. |
| Advani protests |
| Senior BJP leader L K Advani spoke to the Prime Minister to register "protest" over J and K government'su00a0 move to prevent party leaders Arun Jaitley and Sushma Swaraj from entering Jammu. The leaders, who flew to Jammu in a chartered plane, were not allowed to leave the airport for over five hours following which they staged a dharna on the tarmac. Later in the evening, they were driven to Madhopur in Punjab. |
