BJP turning battle against terrorism into one against Kashmiris, Muslims: CPI-M

New Delhi: Accusing the BJP of politicising post-Pulwama developments, the CPI-M on Monday said it was turning a united India's battle against terrorism into one against Kashmiris and Muslims to deepen communal polarisation.

After the Pulwama attack, in which 40 Central Reserve Police Force (CRPF) troopers died, a united India rose against terrorism, it said, adding that "instead of strengthening this, the post-Pulwama developments are seeing an orchestrated effort by the BJP and the Sangh Parivar outfits to rouse jingoistic nationalism".

"The targeting of Kashmiris in various parts of the country, the calls for abrogation of Articles 370 and 35A are all turning this battle of Indians against terrorism into battles against Kashmiris and Muslims to further deepen the communal polarization," the Communist Party of India-Marxist said in a statement after the meeting of its Central Committee.

"It is Prime Minister (Narendra) Modi and BJP leaders who are politicising this issue and disrupting the united fight of Indians against terrorism for their partisan electoral benefit," it said, said while denouncing such efforts.

It added that India must step up its diplomatic efforts to exercise international pressure on Pakistan to purge terror outfits and cross-border terrorist activities.

Criticising Prime Minister Modi's "failed" Jammu and Kashmir policy, the party said during his reign, the number of terrorist incidents saw a rise of 176 per cent and the number of security personnel and civilians killed in such attacks had grown.

"The number of security personnel killed saw a rise of 93 per cent. On an average, 11 terrorists infiltrated every month between 2014 and 2018. More dangerous trend has been the sharp rise in local Kashmiri youth joining terrorist groups from 16 in 2013 to 164 in 2018.

"This deepening alienation of Kashmiri youth is a consequence of the Modi government reneging on its promises to initiate a political process of dialogue with all the stakeholders in Jammu and Kashmir and the implementation of confidence building measures. Clearly, the terrorist strikes continued and intensified even after the surgical strikes carried out by the Indian Air Force after the terrorist attack on army units in Uri in September 2016," it said.

The party also attacked the changed methodology adopted by the government for GDP calculations and said the 2018-19 GDP growth at 7 per cent was the lowest in the last five years.

"2018 last quarter growth rate was even lower at 6.6 per cent. This means that the economy is loosing further steam leading to a sharper growth in unemployment and a further deterioration in the living conditions of the vast majority of our people," the CPI-M said.

It also accused the Modi government of crony capitalism, questioning why it "has handed over five major public airports to the Adani group" by bypassing the consideration of experience in managing airports.

It also called upon the President not to sanction the ordinance passed by the Union Cabinet which allows private corporates to use the Aadhar data base "for profits in the absence of a data protection law".