Government should not echo BJP on Pakistan: CPI(M)

The party said that the BJP govt was caught between its own aggressive postures and the contradictory realities as far as Pakistan was concerned

The Narendra Modi government should "stop echoing the aggressive anti-Pakistan posture of the BJP" if it is serious about a dialogue with Islamabad, the CPI(M) said on Thursday.

"While recognizing that there are forces within Pakistan who would try to hamper the civilian government's efforts to improve relations with India, what the Modi government should do is to stop echoing the aggressive anti-Pakistan posture of the BJP," its journal "People's Democracy" said in an editorial.

"As much as there are difficulties for a meaningful dialogue from within Pakistan, the mindset of the BJP-RSS leadership is also a hindrance to take the process forward," the editorial said.

The Communist Party of India-Marxist mouthpiece said what was required was to pick up the threads of the bilateral discussions held earlier during the UPA-1 government's time with regard to Kashmir and other issues.

"This must be combined with a renewed effort to make Pakistan take up concrete measures to curb the extremist-terrorist groups targeting India."

According to the editorial, the Bharatiya Janata Party government led by Prime Minister Narendra Modi was caught between its own aggressive postures and the contradictory realities as far as Pakistan was concerned.

"This is what has emerged from the episode of the joint statement issued after the prime ministers of India and Pakistan met at Ufa in Russia on July 10 and the events thereafter."

The Ufa meeting, it said, "was an unexpected but positive step".

"However, the aggressive posturing of the BJP towards Pakistan is still at work...

"After accusing the UPA government repeatedly of surrendering national interests by holding talks with Pakistan, the BJP government finds itself unable to come out with a clear cut approach on having a dialogue with Pakistan.

"If the composite dialogue which had been going on for long is not proving to be productive, the way can be found for other levels of engagement," it added.