7 May 2002
ADVANI DENIES AND ADMITS CLOSURE OF
RELIEF CAMPS IN GUJARAT
From Jal Khambata
NEW
DELHI; Home Minister Lal Krishna Advani on Tuesday denied any Gujarat
Government orders to close down the relief camps of the communal
carnage victims but in the same breath said "I found out that
people have returned to villages and such camps are being
closed."
"Government is conscious of its duties
under Article 355 of the Constitution and we will discharge them
thoroughly," he affirmed in the Lok Sabha while pointing out
that irrespective of whatever the Government is doing, the Centre
admits its own responsibility to ensure return of peace and relief
and rehabilitation of the victims.
His stout assertion that
the government has "no information that camps are being closed"
however angered the Opposition to stage a walk-out expressing
dissatisfaction over the government's attitude towards the attempt to
force closure of the relief camps in Gujarat. Only AIADMK of
Jayalalitha did not join the walk-out.
The walk-out was also
to register protest at the ruling members continuously obstructing
the Opposition members from raising the Gujarat issue and even going
to the extent of questioning their morality in remaining silent over
three-and-a-half lakh Hindus of Jammu and Kashmir being forced to
live in refugee camps for nearly 15 years.
The Gujarat issue
was brought into focus during the Zero Hour by CPI(M) leader Somnath
Chatterjee, pointing out that he learnt about the state government's
notice for immediate closure of the relief camps on Monday from
Anjali Ila Menon, a painter of repute, and he had also personally got
it confirmed that the district magistrates have been directed to
serve notices on NGOs to close down the relief camps.
The
Opposition also flared up at Advani asserting that many baseless
stories keep appearing in newspapers and his government has always
tried to verify their veracity. He dubbed the camps' closure as one
such story, and in a way he endorsed a number of the BJP and other
ruling members protesting that the House time was being wasted by
raising issues on the basis of the Media reports without verifying
them.
Referring to appeals of both the Prime Minister and the
Home Minister for unitedly fight out the scourage of communalism
torching Gujarat, Chatterjee pleaded: "Let us jointly rise above
party lines to ensure that these camps are not not closed."
He
was supported by Congress member Priya Ranjan Das Munshi, Samajwadi
Party chief Mulayam Singh Yadav and Muslim Leauge's G M Banatwala,
all expressing concern that on one hand people trying to return home
were assaulted and killed and on the other hand the government was
trying to force closure of the relief camps leaving the victims
nowhere to go. Camps must continue until normalcy is restored and the
climate of insecurity ends, they pleaded.
The Opposition
members also pointed out that the victims were already suffering in
the relief camps on account of lack of sanitation, drinking water and
medicines and cannot even return to their homes because of the fear
of attack.
Somnath Chatterjee pointed out that only on Monday,
two persons were stoned to death when they were trying to go to their
work place. Repeted interruptions by the BJP members brought a retort
from him that "they are the only champions of Hindus in the
country -- disgusting people."
All the same, BJP's
safron-clad Yogi Adityanath did not resist from ridiculing all those
human right champions keeping quite about the Hindus of Kashmir
valley forced to live as refugees in various parts of the country.
Nowhere in the world, citizens have been turned into refugees in
their own country, he said, while lambasting the Opposition shutting
eyes to their sufferings for so many years.
Congress chief
whip Priya Ranjan Das Munshi was, however, quick in supporting Anant
Gite who also raised the issue of the Kashmiri Hindu Pandits driven
out of the valley and forced to live like refugees. END