Don’t revoke AFSPA in Kashmir: Advani

Oct 29, 2011 |

IANS

Thiruvananthapuram

Tags:

Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) leader L.K. Advani on Saturday said his party was against the revocation of the Armed Forces Special Powers Act (AFSPA) in Jammu and Kashmir.

The former deputy Prime Minister, who arrived here late on Friday, spoke to reporters prior to commencing his anti-graft yatra in the state Saturday morning. "Our party's stand is that the contribution made by the army in Jammu and Kashmir should be remembered always. Nothing should be done to weaken the position of the armed forces in the state.

The special powers act need not be withdrawn from there," said Advani. He, however, said that Manipur should be seen as a separate case. AFSPA, which gives sweeping powers to the armed forces, was invoked in the Kashmir Valley in 1990 and Jammu region in 2001. The leader also showered praises on the Travancore royal family for protecting the treasure that was in the Sree Padmanabhaswamy temple for many years.

"The enormous wealth of the temple which is now reported to be worth more than Rs.1 lakh crore has been kept safe by the Travancore royal family for many years. They showed a great sense of responsibility, honesty and uprightness and they should be complimented for that," said Advani. Queried about his view on using the temple wealth for the welfare of the state, as suggested by the Communist Party of India-Marxist, he said it should be left to the tradition and culture of the state.

Post new comment

<form action="/comment/reply/104106" accept-charset="UTF-8" method="post" id="comment-form"> <div><div class="form-item" id="edit-name-wrapper"> <label for="edit-name">Your name: <span class="form-required" title="This field is required.">*</span></label> <input type="text" maxlength="60" name="name" id="edit-name" size="30" value="Reader" class="form-text required" /> </div> <div class="form-item" id="edit-mail-wrapper"> <label for="edit-mail">E-Mail Address: <span class="form-required" title="This field is required.">*</span></label> <input type="text" maxlength="64" name="mail" id="edit-mail" size="30" value="" class="form-text required" /> <div class="description">The content of this field is kept private and will not be shown publicly.</div> </div> <div class="form-item" id="edit-comment-wrapper"> <label for="edit-comment">Comment: <span class="form-required" title="This field is required.">*</span></label> <textarea cols="60" rows="15" name="comment" id="edit-comment" class="form-textarea resizable required"></textarea> </div> <fieldset class=" collapsible collapsed"><legend>Input format</legend><div class="form-item" id="edit-format-1-wrapper"> <label class="option" for="edit-format-1"><input type="radio" id="edit-format-1" name="format" value="1" class="form-radio" /> Filtered HTML</label> <div class="description"><ul class="tips"><li>Web page addresses and e-mail addresses turn into links automatically.</li><li>Allowed HTML tags: <a> <em> <strong> <cite> <code> <ul> <ol> <li> <dl> <dt> <dd></li><li>Lines and paragraphs break automatically.</li></ul></div> </div> <div class="form-item" id="edit-format-2-wrapper"> <label class="option" for="edit-format-2"><input type="radio" id="edit-format-2" name="format" value="2" checked="checked" class="form-radio" /> Full HTML</label> <div class="description"><ul class="tips"><li>Web page addresses and e-mail addresses turn into links automatically.</li><li>Lines and paragraphs break automatically.</li></ul></div> </div> </fieldset> <input type="hidden" name="form_build_id" id="form-d37ebdb38495f3c81d77d5fc8048b437" value="form-d37ebdb38495f3c81d77d5fc8048b437" /> <input type="hidden" name="form_id" id="edit-comment-form" value="comment_form" /> <fieldset class="captcha"><legend>CAPTCHA</legend><div class="description">This question is for testing whether you are a human visitor and to prevent automated spam submissions.</div><input type="hidden" name="captcha_sid" id="edit-captcha-sid" value="85843672" /> <input type="hidden" name="captcha_response" id="edit-captcha-response" value="NLPCaptcha" /> <div class="form-item"> <div id="nlpcaptcha_ajax_api_container"><script type="text/javascript"> var NLPOptions = {key:'c4823cf77a2526b0fba265e2af75c1b5'};</script><script type="text/javascript" src="http://call.nlpcaptcha.in/js/captcha.js" ></script></div> </div> </fieldset> <span class="btn-left"><span class="btn-right"><input type="submit" name="op" id="edit-submit" value="Save" class="form-submit" /></span></span> </div></form>