Will build pressure on BJP-led government to return statehood to J&K after elections: Rahul Gandhi in Surankote

Jammu : Former Congress party president and leader of opposition in Lok Sabha Rahul Gandhi Monday said that the Congress will mount pressure on the Centre to restore the Statehood to J&K and if they fail to so, “Congress will do it.”

This he said, as per the news agency, while addressing a massive rally in support of Congress—NC alliance candidate Muhammad Shahnawaz Choudhary at Surankote this afternoon.

“We wanted the government to return the statehood to Jammu and Kashmir before elections but this couldn’t happen. But after elections we will force the Modi government to do that and if they can’t do it we will do it ourselves,” Gandhi said, with a huge round of applause from the people.

The Congress party’s star campaigner said that it is for the first time in the history of India that a state has been downgraded to Union Territory (UT). “We have seen UTs being converted to states. State being divided and new states being made but not that any state has been downgraded to UT. It is for the first time in the history of India that such a thing has happened.”

Targeting BJP and RSS, Rahul Gandhi said that they only believe in spreading hate and violence and this is what they have done in Jammu and Kashmir and in the rest of the country. “But you can’t end hate with hate but love.

This is the ideological battle of hate and opening shop of love. I travelled from Kanyakumari to Kashmir and from Manipur to Maharashtra and shops of love have been opened everywhere. We have spread only one message that hate helps none.”—(KNO)