New Delhi: Former Jammu and Kashmir Chief Minister and National Conference chief Dr Farooq Abdullah has said the current close-to-a-war situation after the Pulwama terror attack developed due to “refusal of then NDA government led by Atal Behari Vajpayee to listen to my plea not to release terror mastermind Masood Azhar.”
He pointed out that Azhar was arrested in 1994 for spreading hate in the Kashmir valley, but the government set him free in 1999 despite his protests when an Indian Airlines flight IC 814 was hijacked and taken to Kandahar. Azhar gave birth to Jaish-e-Mohd (JeM) after his release.
Dr Abdullah said he had warned then that his release would result in such a situation. “Now look what is happening. All I said that time has become true. It is unfortunate. Had the Centre listened to me that time, we could have been saved of such a dangerous situation between the two nuclear-powered neighbours”.
As then CM, he fiercely opposed the release of Masood Azhar from Kot Bhalwal Jain in Jammu. He said he had argued strongly with Prime Minister Vajpayee and Home Minister Advani that they should not succumb to the hijackers” pressure to set him free.
But they did not listen to me and pressurised me to set Azhar free,” Dr Abdullah said, pointing out several reasons he had cited for not setting him free, including how foreign tourists were kidnapped and brutally executed by the Al-Faran in 1995.
Al-faran was a front of the Harkat-ul-Ansar group to which Azhar belonged. “I had warned that he would plot ways to destroy us all on his freedom from jail. That is what he is doing,” he said while stressing that the only escape route today from the disastrous war is to talk.
“There is no other alternative to talks, but that require Pakistan to first crackdown on the terror masterminds on its soil.”
“Four to five terror masterminds and their groups are holding Pakistan and the sub-continent”s peace and stability to ransom. Pakistan must take action against them for its own interest and for holding talks with India,” Dr Abdullah added.
