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Advani slams Manmohan statement

Special Correspondent

“Government bowing to terrorism”

No headway in the Mumbai train blasts case: Advani
“UPA has no firm plan of action to combat terrorism”

MUMBAI: Leader of the Opposition in the Lok Sabha, L.K. Advani on Wednesday said Prime Minister Manmohan Singh’s reported statement last week that he spent a sleepless night thinking of the plight of families of Indian nationals suspected to be involved in terrorist activities in Britain, was tantamount to condoning terrorism.

Speaking on the first anniversary of the serial train blasts in Mumbai near Bhayander station, Mr. Advani said one had not heard of the Prime Minister having sleepless nights over the plight of victims of the July 11 bomb blasts last year or any of the other terrorist attacks that had taken place in the past three years.

Mr. Advani, who had a daylong programme in Mumbai, visited the house of Chirag Chauhan, one of the blast victims who is paralysed. He later addressed a gathering of victims and their families in Malad.

Last month, he had visited two victims who are in coma in the city’s private hospitals and had written to the Prime Minister expressing his anguish at the slow manner in which relief measures were being carried out. He called on Dr. Singh and urged him to ensure that every promise made to the victims be fulfilled before the Independence Day at least.

Slamming the Centre for its failure to get to the bottom of any of the major terrorist attacks in the last three years, Mr. Advani said this was because the UPA Government lacked a firm plan of action to combat terrorism.

He said the present Government was bowing to terrorism and that all political parties except the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) were seeking pardon for Afzal Guru, accused in the Parliament attack case.

Even in the July 11 serial blasts case, he said not much headway was made despite Union Home Minister Shivraj Patil’s statement that the Government had enough evidence of the perpetrators of the blasts and would take stern action.

He said that under foreign pressure, the UPA Government last year did a U-turn and decided to consider Islamabad a partner in the fight against terrorism.

Agra summit

Mr. Advani said that when his Government was in power it did extend a hand of friendship to Pakistan but did not make any compromises on terrorism. That’s why President Pervez Musharraf was invited to the Agra summit which failed as he believed that what was happening in Kashmir was a freedom struggle, Mr. Advani said.

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