Congress underplaying unanimous resolution on PoJK in Parliament, says Jitendra Singh

Kolkata: Union Minister Jitendra Singh on Wednesday said that the Congress is consciously underplaying a unanimous Parliament resolution on Pakistan-occupied Jammu & Kashmir (PoJK) for vote bank politics.

He said the resolution was passed in 1994 under the Congress government headed by the then-Prime Minister P V Narasimha Rao.

"At a time when elections are going on, Congress leaders feel that any statement claiming that PoJK is a part of India may not go down well with certain sections of their vote bank, and, therefore, they are ready to go to any extent to polarise the electorate even if it is at the cost of national integration", said Singh, the Union Minister of State for Personnel.

Congress is consciously underplaying the unanimous resolution on PoJK in Parliament, he added.

Singh said that when Union Home Minister Amit Shah, Defence Minister Rajnath Singh and other senior BJP leaders reiterated that PoJK is a part of Jammu & Kashmir and thus a part of India, it is the Congress that finds fault with such statements and tries to either "ignore or underplay" it.

At a rally in West Bengal's Serampore, Shah on Wednesday referred to protests in Pakistan-occupied Kashmir and said "PoK is a part of India".

Shah said, "Congress leaders like Mani Shankar Aiyar say it should not be done as they have an atom bomb. But let me say this, Pakistan-occupied Kashmir is part of India and we will take it". Union minister Singh said that on February 22, 1994, both Houses of Parliament had unanimously adopted the resolution, which was also supported by the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), which clearly stated that PoJK was a part of the state of Jammu & Kashmir and was under illegal occupation of Pakistan.

"It was also stated that if at all there is an outstanding issue between India and Pakistan, it is only as to how to retrieve the part of Jammu & Kashmir which continues to be under illegal occupation of Pakistan and to restore it back to India as a part of the territory of Jammu & Kashmir as it existed in 1947", he said.

Singh, who is in West Bengal to campaign for the fifth phase of Lok Sabha polls on May 20, also attacked the state government over corruption.

"People have become wary of corruption and violence let loose by the Mamata Banerjee-led TMC government and they wish to get rid of it", he said.

Singh said that Prime Minister Narendra Modi had also during one of his recent public rallies in West Bengal referred to the state education department scam in the appointment of teachers and expressed concern that the state government was playing with the future of youth.

"It is a matter of shame and disgrace, that once upon a time, Bengal was known to have produced India’s youngest Vice Chancellor of that time - Dr Syama Prasad Mookerjee - who was appointed Vice Chancellor of Calcutta University when he was in his early 30s in recognition of his extraordinary capabilities and talent."

"Today in the land of the great teachers like Syama Prasad Mookerjee, teachers are being appointed through corrupt practices and the malice is so deep that the Supreme Court in its judgement was constrained to describe it as a 'systemic fraud'", the minister said.

Singh said that BJP's performance in the ongoing Lok Sabha polls will pave the way for the party's victory in the state assembly elections later.