The BJP would have called even BR Ambedkar, the father of Indian Constitution, as pro-Pakistan had he been alive, PDP president Mehbooba Mufti said on Sunday, amidst criticism of Congress leader Digvijaya Singh over his remarks on Article 370.
Mehbooba said Article 370, which gave special status to the erstwhile state of Jammu and Kashmir before its operative provisions were nullified by the Centre in 2019, was granted by the Constitution drafted by Ambedkar, but it has been “subverted” by the Centre.
Her remarks came amidst growing criticism of the Congress and Singh over his purported comments in an audio chat on social media that his party will have a “relook” at Article 370 revocation and Jammu and Kashmir’s lost statehood if it returns to power.
The BJP has said that Singh’s remarks were part of a larger pattern of the party being “hand in glove” with Pakistan.
PDP president Mehbooba Mufti, who was a BJP ally for some time in Jammu and Kashmir, criticised the saffron party.
“Thank god Ambedkar ji isn’t alive or else he too would be slandered as pro- Pakistan by BJP,” she said on Twitter.
Singh had purportedly made the remark during a clubhouse conversation with a person, who the BJP said was a journalist of Pakistani origin.
“The decision of revoking Article 370 and reducing the statehood of J&K is extremely, I would say, sad decision, and the Congress party would certainly have a relook on the issue,” Singh had said, according to excerpts of the clubhouse conversation available on social media.
Recently, on Russian Television RT News in a show “News with Rick Sanchez”, a video report about India explained how hate for Muslims in India had weaponized Coronavirus against Muslims, and BJP of Prime Minister Modi tagged Muslims as “Corona Jihadis” andRT News “Corona Bombs”. Therefore, the civil society seems to be concerned about the way government is weaponizing COVID-19 against Muslims.
It may be mentioned that economic strangulation and harassment of Muslims in India earned outrage to India from all over the world, particularly from the Muslim world. Arab and gulf countries strongly condemned treatment faced by Muslins in India. The General Secretariat of the Organization of Islamic Cooperation (OIC) expresses deep concern following recent media accounts of rising anti-Muslim sentiments and Islamophobia within political and media circles and on mainstream and social media platforms, where Indian Muslim minority is blamed of spreading the coronavirus in the country.
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Analysts believe that the government is persistently weaponizing COVID-19 against Muslims. Social activist Harsh Mander says the government is “cynically using the crisis of the pandemic to kill all dissent and create an alternative mythology — that the movement against amending India’s citizenship laws was violent and seditious. If it is not halted in its tracks, both democracy and the fight against the pandemic, would be critically weakened”.