Statement from Nitin Gadkari - President BJP (Bharatiya Janata Party) at Imphal

Imphal, 24th August 2012

Nitin Gadkari on arrival at the airport and seen with State BJP leaders, including Th Chaoba :: Pix - TSE

" I have specially come to Manipur to send a message that the entire Bharatiya janata Party is in complete solidarity with our brothers and sisters in the North East India who are facing some difficulties in some parts of our country. I also declare here that a BJP Goodwill Mission to North-east India will be visiting in next 4-5 days and to reassure those who have returned back here to come back to other parts and continue with their studies and work.

Let me point it out here that the Bharatiya Janata Party mounted a massive country-wide campaign to ensure safety and well-being of the people of the North-Eastern states, who, apparently traumatized by rumours of possible selective attacks against them in certain areas, were trying to flee back home last week.

The BJP-ruled state governments and the party units at all levels in each state were immediately asked to gear up their respective machinery to maintain peace and harmony and put in place effective mechanisms to assuage the feelings of the students and youth from the North-Eastern states.

Our Chief Ministers have been personally supervising all confidence-building measures and other necessary steps to provide security to the people of North-Eastern States and have issued repeated appeals to them to return to their place of work.

The party has set up help desks at important railway stations, especially in Bangalore, Hyderabad and Pune and put up help lines to provide them assistance.

We recently had a Conclave of BJP Chief Ministers’ in Delhi where we have decided to take every possible step to ensure safety and security of our NE brethren in our States.

I have been in constant touch with the chief ministers of BJP-ruled states and state units of the party and exhorting them to convince the people from North-Eastern states that there was absolutely no threat to them in any part of the country. BJP workers have been asked to provide protection and assistance to the people from the North-East.

l wish to categorically state that the BJP will ensure all citizen belonging to the North-Eastern States are free to travel and reside in any part of the country.

In the BJP-ruled state of Karnataka, they are absolutely secure and can live freely in peace devoid of any kind of discrimination and enjoy the fruits of development in the IT and other sectors of industry.

Karnataka chief minister Shri Jagadish Shettar has assured me that no incident of violence has been reported in Bangalore or in any other town in the state and that police protection was being provided to those who asked for it. Most of the people seeking to leave said they had no direct experience of a threat or violence against them.

The Karnataka CM has assured the North- East States Students Association that “Karnataka belongs to all who are living there. Karnataka is safer than Assam. Nobody should panic or succumb to the rumour-mongering.”

He has promised the Association that he will personally examine all the cases of alleged harassment brought to his notice. Police in Karnataka has been asked to take stern action against the rumour-mongers. The state government is coordinating with the central government in bringing the culprits to book.

Assam violence clashes between Indians and Foreigners

The shameful incidents of violence in Assam that began in the Kokrajhar, Chirang and Bhuri districts of Assam and later spread to other areas in the state were basically clashes between Indians and Foreigners.

These most reprehensible clashes which have so far claimed nearly 80 lives and displaced nearly 5 lakh people are the result of Congress Party’s vote bank politics in Assam. Unless and until Congress desists from indulging in vote bank politics in Assam, the security of the state and the region will remain in danger.

The subsequent violent protests in Mumbai on August 12, too, appear to have been organised as a part of the Congress party’s hidden agenda to communalize the Assam violence.

The BJP has been protesting against infiltrations from across the border. We are for deportation of all the infiltrators and sealing of the border to prevent further infiltrations.

I once again reiterate that the vote bank politics indulged in by the Congress is squarely responsible for the large scale infiltration of Bangladeshis and the resultant dispalcement of Indian citizens in parts of the Norh east. People are aware of the fact that it was the Congress which introduced the IMDT Act and provided overt protection to the infiltrators and the same Party later tried to undo the impact of the Supreme Court ruling declaring the IMDT Act as null and void. Congress led UPA is responsible for this situation in no uncertain terms.