The Narendra Modi government, while taking credit for getting Jaish-e-Mohammad chief Masood Azhar blacklisted, should also tell the citizens that it was during a BJP regime that Azhar was released and he transformed into big threat to India, the Congress said on Thursday.

While welcoming the declaration of Azhar as a global terrorist on Wednesday, the Congress said that on the same day, 15 Maharashtra policemen were killed in a naxal attack in Gadchiroli which did not garner enough attention.

“Fact is that it is the Modi government that has systematically endangered our internal security. The BJP should also tell people under whose regime Azhar was freed. It was only after his release in 1999 that he emerged as such a big threat to India,” Congress spokesperson Rajeev Shukla said at a press conference here. He added that when Congress government got Hafiz Saeed declared a global terrorist, it did not make a big song and dance about it.

Former Home Minister P. Chidambaram, in a series of tweets, too pointed out that Azhar was released in 1999 under the Vajpayee government.

The Congress also pointed out that Pulwama and Jammu and Kashmir were delinked by the UN Security Council while declaring Azhar as a global terrorist.