New Delhi:
Pushed on the backfoot over the release of jailed Kashmiri separatist leader Masarat Alam, Union Home Minister Rajnath Singh today asserted that his government’s top priority is national security and not the continuance of government in the state where BJP is an alliance partner with PDP.
His remarks came on a day Opposition parties in Parliament upped the ante against the Government over reports that the Jammu and Kashmir government was planning to release 800 more separatists and sought to know if the state’s Governor has mentioned this in his report to the Centre.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi had made it clear in Parliament on Monday that release of Alam was not acceptable and that the government won’t tolerate any compromise with the nation’s integrity.
Putting the Government on the mat, Opposition wondered whether BJP has a “secret pact” with PDP on the issue and demanded re-arrest of Alam against whom there are 27 criminal cases, including murder, sedition and conspiracy. He was detained eight times.
The Home Minister said, “My government will not compromise with national security at any cost. For us any government, whether in alliance or not, that is not our priority. Our priority is country and its security. You should understand this intention of ours.
“I will only make only one statement as of now, as I had said in Parliament yesterday. For us, government is not the priority but for us country is priority and it is topmost,” he said.
“You should understand this fact and I think everything is encapsulated in this statement,” Singh said on the sidelines of the 46th Raising Day of central security force CISF in Ghaziabad.
In Jammu, PDP said the Jammu and Kashmir government will abide by the court directives on the release of political prisoners.
“Whatever the Supreme Court and courts tell us, we are going to abide by that (on release of political prisoners in future),’ senior PDP leader and Minister for Sports, Imran Raza Ansari told reporters on the sidelines of a sports event.
