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Allies should part ways with BJP: Azad

By Shujaat Bukhari

SRINAGAR APRIL 14 . Senior Congress leader and president of the Jammu and Kashmir Pradesh Congress Committee, Ghulam Nabi Azad, today called on the National Democratic Alliance allies to snap ties with the Bharatiya Janata Party. ``If they do not end their relationship with the BJP, we will have serious doubts about their secular credentials,'' he told a news conference here.

He alleged that the BJP allies were "blackmailing'' the Centre. "They should stop this and not deceive their own people''.

Referring to the Prime Minister, Atal Behari Vajpayee's statement at the BJP national executive meeting in Goa, he said "we have trust in the secularism of Hindus in India and not in people like Mr. Vajpayee, who has thrown to the winds all moral values by attacking Islam and Christianity''.

Terming the BJP as the biggest communal party in the country, Mr. Azad said it posed a major threat on this account. "Mr. Vajpayee should know about secularism from the Indian media, the Supreme Court and people like Justice Srikrishna and Justice J.S. Verma''.

Reiterating his party's stand that it would not enter into any alliance with any party during the coming Assembly elections, he said the Congress would play its role as an effective opposition in the State. "We are not against any individual, but will raise the shortcomings of the Farooq Abdullah Government'', he said and expressed concern over unemployment, scarcity of power and water and the increasing custodial killings at the hands of security forces, particularly the Special Operations Group of the J&K Police.

Mr. Azad said Kashmir was facing two types of problems. One was external — Pakistan-sponsored terrorism — and the other internal. For the internal problems, he said, free and fair elections were the only solution. He denied that he was appointed PCC chief after he defended the presence of senior State leader, Moulvi Iftikhar Ansari, in the Farooq government.

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