Mumbai: Highlighting the salience of the scrapping of Article 370 of the Constitution yet again, Prime Minister Narendra Modi dared the Opposition parties on Sunday to bring back the provision that granted a special status to Jammu and Kashmir.
The BJP has already made it clear it would make the abrogation of Article 370 its main electoral plank in the Maharashtra Assembly poll campaign.
Addressing his first rally during the campaign for the Vidhan Sabha polls, in Jalgaon, Mr Modi said Jammu and Kashmir was “not just a parcel of land, but the crown of India”, and claimed it would not take more than four months to normalise the kind of situation that prevailed there for 40 years.
Stating that it was the Opposition parties which were “politicising the unprecedented decision of scrapping of Article 370,” he accused them of “speaking on the same lines as the neighbouring country” on the issue.
Accusing Opposition leaders of shedding crocodile tears on the issue of Article 370, he said: “I challenge them, if they have the guts, to declare in their manifesto for the state elections and future polls too, that they will bring back Articles 370 and 35A, which the BJP, the Modi government, scrapped... that they will change the August 5 decision. Stop shedding these crocodile tears on the issue.”
