Home Minister Rajnath Singh’s accusation that the term “Hindu terrorism” was coined during UPA rule unleashed a war of words today with Congress alleging distortion and that it was being raised by BJP to “polarise” the country while the latter raked up Rahul Gandhi’s remarks on radical groups.
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The term “Hindu terror” was used by former Union home minister Sushilkumar Shinde in his address to a Congress party convention in Jaipur in January 2013.
The mastermind of the 2008 Mumbai terror attacks, Hafiz Saeed, who is among India’s most wanted men and roams free in Pakistan, who regularly makes provocative anti-India speeches. As the protests intensified, he hit back, “In this House in 2013, the then Home Minister (P Chidambaram) had coined the new terminology “Hindu terrorism” in order to change the direction of probe”.
Addressing a press conference here, Leader of the Opposition in the Rajya Sabha Ghulam Nabi Azad accused Singh of making deliberate attempts to divide the country and use the forum in Parliament to malign the Congress party.
The Home Minister asserted that terrorism has no caste or religion and “We all must discuss terrorism with all the seriousness”.
He urged Deputy Speaker M Thambidurai to expunge Singh’s comments which he had made after his statement on the Gurdaspur attack. Singh said that groundwork research of Global Positioning System data indicated that the terrorists had come from Pakistan through the area near Tash in Gurdaspur district just at the point where the Ravi River enters Pakistan. “Terrorism is the biggest challenge facing the country”.
Finance minister Arun Jaitley had on Thursday criticised the opposition Congress party leadership of preventing discussion on terrorism by saying the its leadership had failed the test on a matter of national security.
He assured the House that his government is committed to deal with terrorists strongly to ensure safety and security of the nation.
Giving the statement amid din and anti-government slogans in the upper house of parliament, Rajnath Singh also lauded the Punjab Police for neutralising the three terrorists.
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After the House reassembled, Kharge said: “The home minister played politics to defame previous governments”.
