SRINAGAR: Expressing concerns over incidents of mob lynching in the country and people being targeted because of their religion, former Jammu and Kashmir chief minister Farooq Abdullah on Thursday said that an atmosphere of ‘hatred’ was being created prior to the Lok Sabha elections.
‘It is easy for the Prime Minister to talk of kashmiriyat, insaniyat and jahmuriat from the Red Fort. But what I see in this Nation today is hatred growing before the elections,’Dr Abdullah said while addressing a function organised to confer the Lal Ded national award on Sahitya Akademi Award writer Nayantara Sehgal.
He said every election held in this nation has “divided us rather than uniting us”.
Dr Abdullah said that there had been instances of lynching and the people were being targeted because of their religion which had tarnished the secular image of the country.
Accusing the present government of trying to destroy the legacy of Pandit Jawaharlal Nehru, India’s first prime minister, he said, “We used to think our elder people are blessings from the God, but today Nehru is denounced as a demon. Nehru worked as PM of this country for 17 years. ‘
He lambasted those who forgot the contribution of leaders like Nehru “who gave their life and blood for the unity of this nation.”
Dr Abdullah praised Nayantara Sehgal’s role in writing against her own cousin sister, the then Prime Minister Indira Gandhi, during the 1975 emergency, which he termed a ‘draconian period of Indian democracy’.
“It takes courage to stand against our own” he added.
Former RAW chief A S Dulat was also present on the occasion.
