Defence minister Rajnath Singh on Saturday while addressing a programme, where Assam-based veterans of 1971 India-Pakistan War were felicitated said all three defence services wanted the removal of Armed Forces Special Powers Act from Jammu and Kashmir soon.
The AFSPA was imposed in July 1990 in the Kashmir Valley and in August 2000 in the Jammu region to curb insurgency. Earlier also during his visit to J&K as the home minister way back in 2015, Singh had said that the armed forces act can be removed when the situation is conducive.
“Some people believe that the Indian Army does not want AFSPA to be removed. I want to say from this forum today that the Indian Army has a minimum role in the matter of internal security. Army only wants that soon the situation in Jammu and Kashmir should be completely normal and AFSPA can be removed from there too,” said the Defence Minister while felicitating the 1971 War veterans and their family members at a function in Guwahati, Assam.
“It’s no small thing that for the last 3-4 years, the work of removing AFSPA is being done in the northeastern states. Recently AFSPA was completely removed from 23 districts of Assam,” the minister stated while recalling the recent developments on the AFSPA in the northeastern states.
Taking the opportunity, Rajnath Singh also asserted that India would not hesitate to act against terrorists who target the country from across the border. Singh said the government was working to wipe out terrorism from the country.
“India has been successful in giving out the message that terrorism will be strongly dealt with. We will not hesitate to cross borders if the country is targeted from outside,” he maintained. Singh also said that the eastern boundary of the country is currently experiencing more peace and stability compared to the western frontier, with Bangladesh being a friendly neighbour.
“The tension that India experiences on western frontier does not exist along eastern boundary as Bangladesh is a friendly country,” he noted. “The problem of infiltration has almost ended. There is peace and stability at the border (in the eastern frontier) now,” the minister said.
On the recent withdrawal of Armed Forces Special Powers Act (AFSPA) from different parts of northeast, the defence minister stated that the government did so whenever the situation in a place improved. Maintaining that there was a “public misconception” that the Army always wanted AFSPA to remain in force, Singh added, “It is the situation that is responsible for imposition of AFSPA, not the Army.”
(With inputs from agencies)
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