Sonia Gandhi and Manmohan Singh along with other party leaders at the Congress’s 84th plenary at Indira Gandhi Indoor Stadium in New Delhi on Sunday. Anil Sharma
FORMER PRIME Minister Manmohan Singh on Sunday launched a blistering attack on the Narendra Modi government, saying that it “mismanaged” Jammu and Kashmir and that the government’s talk of fighting two-and-a-half wars was “yet another hollow promise” even as his party accused the government of damaging India’s profile globally by conducting the foreign policy in a “cavalier manner”.
In a resolution on foreign policy moved by party leader Anand Sharma and seconded by party MP Gaurav Gogoi at the party plenary, the Congress said the BJP government has “disrupted” Indian foreign policy’s “continuity” that had the “backing of a strong national consensus”.
It said Prime Minister Narendra Modi has “pursued a personalised foreign policy”. “The foreign policy engagements and PM’s visits abroad have been reduced to being purely transactional,” the resolution said. Speaking on the resolution, Manmohan Singh, who received a standing ovation from the delegates for his attack on the government for its “failures” in economy, said, “We also must recognise that the Modi government has mismanaged the Jammu and Kashmir problem as never before.”
He said police and the Army in the state were working against each other and the atmosphere was “deteriorating day in and day out”. “That is obvious from the fact that our borders are not secure, whether it is cross-border terrorism or internal terrorism, internal insurgency. There are today issues which are a source of great worry to all our citizens,” he said.
The government, he said, possibly feels that these issues will get sorted out on their own. “That’s not going to happen,” he said.
On Pakistan, Singh said India must recognise it as a neighbour but expressed concern over Islamabad’s support to cross-border terrorism. “That certainly is not acceptable to us. We must, therefore, warn Pakistan that this is a path which is mutually destructive of peace and prosperity in the sub-continent,” he said.
Singh lamented that only about 1.6 per cent of the country’s GDP was spent on defence expenditure, which, he said, could not meet the challenges that the security apparatus posed. He said the government’s talk of fighting two-and-a-half wars was “yet another hollow promise”.
Army Chief Bipin Rawat was recently quoted as saying that the Army was well prepared. “Indian Army is ready for a two-and-a-half front (China, Pakistan and internal security requirements) war,” he had said.
Moving the resolution Sharma said: “Congress expresses its concern over the conduct of foreign policy in a cavalier manner, which has damaged India’s profile globally and undermined national interest.”
He said the BJP government has pursued a foreign policy away from the Nehruvian vision. He said the government’s foreign policy lacked coherence and a futuristic vision. “The Prime Minister of India is making disparaging remarks against his predecessors and expects us not to question or challenge what is being done. He is the first Prime Minister who has undermined the country,” Sharma said. There is an urgent need to re-calibrate equations with the US, arrest the slide in relations with Russia and improve communication and trust with China, the resolution said.