BJP to raise Article-370 issue in Parliament : Kirti Azad

Jammu, Feb 22: BJP is planning to take up the issue of Article-370 and failure of the J&K government to conduct three tier elections to local civic bodies as well as the issue of implementation of 73rd and 74th Amendments of Indian Constitution in the current session of Parliament, which began yesterday. This was disclosed by BJP MP Lok Sabha & former Cricketer Kirti Azad, who is also MP Prabhari (Incharge) J&K for issues to be raised in the Lok Sabha relating to Jammu & Kashmir.

While addressing a press conference at party headquarters today flanked by

State Chief Spokesperson & National Executive Me-mber Dr. Jitendra Singh and State General Secretaries Kavinder Gupta and Bali Bhagat. Kirti Azad said that he will take up the issue of the Article-370 under Rule 193 of Parliament Business Rules to enable a wider discussion on the subject. He said that Article-370 which was meant to be temporary has done more harm than good to the state. Referring to the Parliament's Unanimous Resolution of 1994, which resolved to get back the part of Jammu and Kashmir which was under illegal occupation of Pakistan, Kirti Azad said that today is the historic day because it was on this day i.e. February 22 that this resolution was passed. Unfort-unately, the Congress led governments which have been in power for most of the time since then have not taken any concrete steps to ensure implementation of this resolution.  Kirti Azad said that inspite of Congress led government at the Centre and the Congress coalition in the state, the Central government and the state governments have failed to extend as many as 133 provisions of Indian Constitution to J&K, thus depriving the people of this state from the benefits available to people in other states.

These include reservations for SCs, ST and women, he added.

In response to a question, Kirti Azad condemned the serial blasts of Hyderabad and said that the Union Home Minister Sushil Kumar Shinde should resign owning intelligence and security failure. He asked why POTA which was brought in by the BJP-led NDA government had not been implemented effectively by the UPA-1 and UPA-2.

In response to question regarding to state government refusing to allow Praveen Bhai Togadia to come out of Airport on his arrival at Jammu on Thursday, Dr. Jitendra Singh said that the BJP believes that the democratic rights of every Indian citizen should be given due respect irrespective of whoever is the person

Source: http://earlytimesnews.com/newsdet.aspx?q=105664