Senior Bharatiya Janata Party leader L K Advani has described the "proxy war" and stone-pelting incidents in Kashmir Valley as a result of Pakistan's failure to win the first Indo-Pak war in 1947 and favoured a firm approach to tackle the problem.
"Today's proxy war, the stone pelting, is a result of Pakistan's failure to win (conventional) wars against India ...the nature of the 1947 invasion has changed but the war continues," Advani said on Friday.
"Some measure of firmness" was required to find a solution to the problem, he said at a seminar here on 'Resolving the Kashmir Issue'.
The BJP parliamentary party chairman said the strategy of troublemakers is to use bullets with stones while targeting security forces. "This show the presence of militants in the crowd. The fact has been officially confirmed and shows that people from across the border are taking interest," he said.
He also used the opportunity to attack the Congress for "losing an opportunity in 1947-48 to win the war." He claimed that the leadership of the day decided against pushing the army ahead which had already taken back large areas from Pakistan in the counter-offensive.
Quoting a book, Advani said initially Congress was against Article 370 which gives special status to Jammu and Kashmir.
"The issue of Article 370 was to be put up before the Constituent Assembly. But Prime Minister (Jawaharlal Nehru) left for abroad and asked Gopalaswamy Iyengar (his cabinet colleague) to do the needful...on the suggestion of Sardar Patel, he took the matter to Congress for approval (before moving the Constituent Assembly).
"Congress was not ready. But Sardar Patel asked Congress to approve it as it was the desire of the prime minister," Advani said.
He said what started in 1947 was totally different today. "After using terrorism as a proxy means, mass frenzy is being created in the state in which women and children also get involved and security forces are forced to shoot at them," Advani claimed.
The BJP leader supported suggestions that security forces should avoid using firepower on protesters and if they are forced to shoot, they should only disable them. "Shoot not to kill," he said.
