New Delhi: The Congress accused the government of playing into Pakistan’s hands, claiming that India had lost out on all the gains of the last 10 years.
“Unfortunately, the NDA government has played into Pakistan’s hands by being imprecise, by being unprepared, by lacking focus, by being ad hoc, by not doing sufficient hard-nosed groundwork, good old-fashioned diplomacy and preparation.
“We are very sad that all the gains of the last 10-odd years on Indo-Pak settlement of at least some issues, are given a setback by such aborted talks. No such opportunity should have been given to Pakistan to wriggle out of as serious an issue as terror,” Congress spokesman Abhishek “Manu” Singhvi said.
In Srinagar, J&K chief minister Mufti Muhammad Sayeed expressed disappointment over the cancellation of talks, and hoped that “the break in talks would be temporary”.
The cancellation of the meeting comes as an indication that New Delhi will be in no mood to resume the two-way dialogue with Hurriyat Conference.
Hurriyat Conference — a conglomerate of Kashmir’s separatist parties and groups, which has since split into three — had a series of rounds of talks at highest level with the Atal Behari Vajpayee government in 2004 and the Manmohan Singh government to put an end to the hostility.
