Jammu and Kashmir Bharatiya Janata Party leader Choudhary Lal Singh on Friday warned journalists, asking them to “mend their ways” over their reporting of the Kathua case, referring to the assassination of Rising Kashmir editor Shujaat Bukhari. Singh, who was a minister in the BJP’s alliance government with the People’s Democratic Party, was asked to resign from the cabinet in April after he participated in a rally in support of the accused in the Kathua case.

“Now I will tell Kashmiri journalists to draw a line on the journalism you do and how you have to live,” Singh said at a press conference in Srinagar, the Hindustan Times reported. “Do you have to live like what happened to Basharat, so that such a situation emerges?”

Shujaat Bukhari’s brother Basharat Bukhari was the law minister in the PDP-BJP government before the saffron party withdrew from the alliance last week. “So mend your ways and draw a line, so that this brotherhood remains intact and there is progress,” Singh said.

National Conference leader Omar Abdullah criticised Singh for his remarks, saying Bukhari’s death was now a “tool for goons to threaten other journalists”.

The National Conference, in a tweet, demanded that the Jammu and Kashmir Police take immediate cognisance of Singh’s remarks.