“People should stop playing politics with country’s internal and external security,” is how BJP leader RK Singh started his interview on CNN-IBN, which went on to be explosive – to say the least.
Singh, who was the Union Home Secretary during the Afzal Guru hanging lashed out at P Chidambaram for his remarks that Guru’s case might not have been judged properly.
Chidambaram has been a home minister, it is sad that he has made such a statement. Afzal was hanged seven years after SC verdict. You do not make a statement of that hanging now. You did not have the courage to hand Afzal for seven years, now come on.RK Singh, former Union Home Secretary
Singh said being a
former Union Home Minister, Chidambaram should have been more responsible with
his statements as this would give an advantage to the extremist elements, who
forever think that Afzal was not guilty.
The senior Congress leader who held both home and finance portfolios expressed doubts about the way Afzal Guru’s case was handled to which Singh said, “I believe it was handled very well. It couldn’t have been better.”
‘I Believe Chidambaram is Writing a Book’
Neither the then Union Home Minister Sushil Kumar Shinde nor the Union Finance Minister P Chidambaram had raised any doubt about Guru’s execution and Afzal Guru’s mercy plea was also rejected by the President Pranab Mukherjee.
If he (Chidambaram) had doubts, he could have written in the file when he was reading the mercy petition. Chidambaram or Shinde did not raise any issue with Afzal execution.RK Singh, former Union Home Secretary
Singh also sarcastically said, “I believe Chidambaram is
writing a book (and so, is raising the issue now).”
Questions were also asked about the delay in notifying the family of the 2001 Parliament attack case convict Mohammed Afzal Guru.
Had the initimation (to the family) been sent three days in advance, the time would have been used to mobilise an uprising (by the jihadi elements) in the valley. Apart from hanging Afzal, you would have to shoot ten people to handle the uprising in the valley.
‘Why Sympathy for Terrorists?’
Singh was also expressing surprise as to why people are suddenly turning sympathisers for the terrorists.
How can one show sympathy for terrorists who kill our soldiers every day? What is happening in this country? Captains and soldiers are being killed and people have sympathy for terrorists. Has anybody asked where have the terrorists come from in the Kashmir entrepreneur institute shootout?
Talking on the Ishrat Jahan case, Singh said that GK Pillai,
the then home secretary “was not party to the changed affidavit.” There were
two affidavits filed in the Jahan case and Chidambaram was the Union Home
Minister then. So, “there might be political interference in the filing of the second affidavit.”
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