Chandigarh: Terming the Nagrota attack as a “failure” of the Narendra Modi government to secure the borders, Punjab Congress chief Amarinder Singh asked the Prime Minister to take urgent and serious steps to de-escalate tensions at the frontier.
Expressing anguish and grief at the death of seven Army personnel in a terrorist attack at the Nagrota army camp, Amarinder said the central government had completely “failed” to protect the borders, which it had claimed were completely secure in the wake of the surgical strikes two months ago.
“While Modi and his team, particularly Defence Minister Manohar Parrikar, were busy thumping their chests, taking credit for securing the country s borders through surgical strikes, terrorist and military incursions from across the border continued unabated,” Amarinder said said in a statement.
He regretted the loss of lives in such incidents, pointing out that several personnel had been killed, and body of some of them mutilated, in “a spate” of attacks in recent days.
Urging the Modi government to take urgent steps to prevent recurrence of such incidents, Amarinder said rather than “looking for opportunities” to create “war hysteria”, the Prime Minister should, “in national interest, engage with Islamabad”, as well as the international community, to reduce the border tensions without further delay.