Jammu-Kashmir: MoS Jitendra Singh blames Congress for the situation

Minister of State in PMO Jitendra Singh on Sunday said the situation in Jammu and Kashmir was 'an accumulative outcome of the axe of omission and commission committed by the Congress'.

Taking a dig at the Congress ahead of the Bharatiya Janata Party's (BJP) Executive Meet, Dr Singh said, "I think all of us need to remind P Chidambaram (the Congress leader) the kind of situation we face in Kashmir today is an accumulative outcome of the axe of omission and commission committed by his party, which was at the helm of affairs for as many as almost seventy years after Independence both in the state and the Center."

Dr Singh added that he does not think the nation allows a former home minister the privilege to deliver sermons on his own axe of omission and commission.

"BJP for the first time is following an approach which is based on consistency, clarity, conviction and we are trying to clear the mess and we are trying to redeem the undoing of the successive governments which began right from the dawn of Independence with the infamous Nehru (vian) blunders," he opined.

His statement came after Chidamabaram on Saturday asserted that when people of Jammu and Kashmir ask for 'azadi' they seek greater autonomy.

"The demand in Kashmir is to respect in letter and spirit Article 370 and that means they want greater autonomy. My interactions in Jammu and Kashmir led me to the conclusion that when they ask for Azadi, overwhelming majority wants autonomy," Chidambaram had said.

His statement comes close to the heel of appointment of former Intelligence Bureau director Dineshwar Sharma as interlocutor for the state by the Modi government.

In 2010, Chidambaram as Home Minister in the United Progressive Alliance (UPA) government appointed three interlocutors- journalist Dilip Padgaonkar, Prof M. M. Ansari, Information Commissioner and Prof. (Mrs) Radha Kumar, trustee of Delhi Policy Group- to hold dialogue with all the stakeholders in Jammu and Kashmir.

-ANI