JEDDAH, 22 May 2003 — India and Pakistan should live in peace like two good neighbors on the subcontinent, according to a leading Indian politician.
Samajwadi Party’s western Maharashtra state unit President Abu Asim Azmi said his party believed in the principles of the late Socialist leader Dr. Ram Manohar Lohia. “We believe that India, Pakistan and Bangladesh should form a confederation to peacefully coexist in the subcontinent,” Azmi told Arab News in an exclusive interview yesterday.
Azmi, a member of the Rajya Sabha, India’s upper house of Parliament, arrived here yesterday on a private visit to perform Umrah.
“Our party has always maintained that we should have good relations with Pakistan. But when we said that we were labeled as agents of Pakistan’s ISI,” Azmi said.
He said the people of both countries were poor. “Instead of wasting money on buying arms and ammunition, the money should be used to provide basic necessities to the poor and needy people of the two countries,” Azmi added. He said both India and Pakistan should forget the past and should work for a better future. “But this should not happen at the behest of America. America is neither our friend nor Pakistan’s. It is only interested in selling its arms to the two countries. America’s only interest is that all the countries of the world should become weakened so that it can perform its role of policeman without any hindrance,” Azmi alleged.
Azmi also said that the increasing incidence of terrorism in Indian-held Kashmir should be checked. “For relations to improve, it is essential to put an end to terrorism in Kashmir,” he added.
When asked if his party was willing to join hands with the Congress party for the countrywide parliamentary elections in 2004, Azmi replied: “For the sake of secularism we are willing to swallow any bitter pill. We are in favor of all secular parties joining hands to fight the elections on one platform against the communal parties.”
But he said all depended on Sonia Gandhi’s advisers. “Sonia should realize that it is not proper to sow confusion among Muslims and benefit from that. She cannot rule like a queen. But as the leader of the biggest opposition party, she should take with her all the smaller parties to do well in the elections,” Azmi said.
He accused the Congress party of adopting double standards on the issue of the implementation of the Prevention of Terrorism Act (POTA) and declared that his party would launch a protest in Maharashtra soon to demand the “stringent” law be scrapped.
“Congress opposed introduction of the POTA in Parliament and declared its resolve to oppose this law all over the country but in Maharashtra the coalition government led by the same party has gone all-out to implement the Act,” Azmi said. Charging Congress with adopting double standards, Azmi said the party had opposed installation of Hindu Maha Sabha leader Veer Savarkar’s portrait in Parliament in New Delhi, but in Maharashtra it was instrumental in installing Savarkar’s portrait in the state assembly.
“Congress is strong as an opposition but becomes weak when it comes to power in the states”, he said. He said the POTA in Maharashtra was akin to the earlier terrorism act and should be scrapped as the provisions for bail were stringent and the law was likely to be misused. He alleged that the POTA had already been misused in Maharashtra, citing the instance of Mohammed Afroze, who was booked under the act for planning a series of terrorist attacks abroad and later cleared of the charges. “Afroze has filed a petition in Bombay High Court seeking 100 million rupees in damages from the government. But he has been pressurized to withdraw it, otherwise his younger brother’s life would be destroyed. I don’t know whether he has withdrawn the petition or not,” Azmi said.
Azmi will meet members of the Indian community and will also address a press conference in the evening at Baghdadiya Gharbiya today.
