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(Pi Bureau)
New Delhi : Amid tensions and stone pelting by kashmiri youths in valley ,Jammu and Kashmir Chief Minister Mehbooba Mufti is scheduled to meet Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Monday as the Valley continues to remain on the edge days after the bypoll violence and amid reports of Kashmiri students being threatened outside the state.
Mehbooba, whose PDP is in alliance with the BJP in the state, is likely to press for some political initiative from the Centre to address the situation.
On Sunday, a 27-year-old Kashmiri researcher at the premier BITS Pilani in Rajasthan left for home after alleging that he was threatened by some unidentified persons, barely three weeks after joining the institute. Uttra Pradesh Meerut district witnessed hording telling Kashmiri youths to quit UP.
Hashim Sofi, who hails from Bandipora district of Kashmir, had told the hostel’s chief warden that on Friday morning, he had found the door of his room and his clothes inked with threats and abuses, an official of the institute said. Following the incident, BITS Pilani administration ordered a probe.
Prime Minister Modi has asked the chief ministers of all states to “reach out” to Kashmiri students, reiterating an earlier appeal by Union Home Minister Rajnath Singh. At a NITI Aayog meeting on Sunday, Modi “seconded” Mehbooba’s suggestion that states should take interest in the students from Jammu and Kashmir. The Prime Minister “urged states to reach out to these students (of J&K) from time to time”, said a statement by the PMO quoting Modi’s concluding remarks.
The reported threats to Kashmiri students have given grounds to the Opposition National Conference whose working president Omar Abdullah has questioned Mehbooba Mufti’s continuance in office. “Posters threatening Kashmiris in UP, BJP Ministers threaten Kashmiris with bullets, BJP poaches MLAs to win MLC seat and @MehboobaMufti clings on,” Omar had said in a tweet.
The Modi-Mufti meeting also comes against the backdrop of recent bypoll to Srinagar Lok Sabha constituency which witnessed large-scale violence and the lowest turnout ever. In the bypoll, the PDP also lost the seat to National Conference, just in nearly three years after the 2014 general elections.
On the other side BJP Leader Chander Ganga said strong action against the stone pelters saying, “traitors and stone-pelters should be treated with bullets”.
