Surgical strikes: Cong accuses BJP of 'crass opportunism'

Raising serious objections on the "politicisation" of surgical strikes along LoC, Congress today accused BJP of "crass opportunism" by using the occasion to win upcoming elections, particularly in Uttar Pradesh.
Congress spokesperson Kapil Sibal also said the strikes should be used to send a clear message across the border and not to flare up passions within the country.
He also criticised the government for its failure to highlight in the BRICS meeting cross-border terrorism emanating from across the border and to isolate Pakistan as none of these issues were mentioned in the Goa Declaration of the five-nation association.
"Anybody who has successfully done an operation of this nature should get the credit. I don't dispute it. But if anyone uses the occasion to win an upcoming election, in Punjab and particularly in Uttar Pradesh, is crass opportunism," Sibal told PTI.

"Such strikes have been done earlier too, but the government of the day kept quiet. Such matters should be done quietly. If you start doing jingoism, then it has serious consequences. You are sort of raising passions in the country. Strikes of this nature need to be done to send a message to the other side without raising passions within the country," he also said.
Accusing the present dispensation of failing to put across its point at BRICS, he said, "The headlines were terror and Pakistan being the mother ship of all terror activities. But nothing of this kind is mentioned in the BRICS Declaration in Goa."

Sibal said while there is no mention of Uri, Pathankot, Gurdaspur or Pakistan in the declaration, one finds Al Nusra and ISI in it which is impacting Russia and China.

"What Russia and China wanted, they got, but what India wanted never got and we were were the host country for BRICS," he said.
He also said that if Prime Minister Narendra Modi wants to earn respect of the countrymen he should not politicise the surgical strikes.
He also termed banning Pakistani artistes and boycotting Chinese products as issues which are "politicised" to flare up passions within and nothing else.