The Bharatiya Janata Party on Thursday called senior Congress leader Ghulam Nabi Azad “mentally bankrupt” for his comment that democracy had ceased to exist in Jammu and Kashmir after Centre’s decision to revoke its special status, PTI reported. The Congress leader, who was on a six-day tour of the state, had on Tuesday described the situation in the region as “very bad”.

Senior state BJP leader and MLC Ramesh Arora said that Azad should respect the decision of the majority, which supported the central government’s August 5 order. “In fact, Azad is speaking such words which kill the basic spirit of democracy,” Arora said. “Pakistan is projecting this viewpoint at the international level as it suits them.”

The BJP leader claimed that Congress’ leadership had failed to grasp the gravity of the situation. He also asked Azad to explain why the Kashmir dispute was taken up in the United Nations by former Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru and “why his party [Congress] did not have the courage to solve the internal issue itself?”

“Azad should explain why democracy was killed in 1975 when Sheikh Abdullah was installed as chief minister of Jammu and Kashmir when the Congress headed by Syed Mir Qasim was in power,” Arora said. “It was the murder of democracy.” He also criticised the erstwhile Congress-led government at the Centre to impose Emergency in the country in the same year.

Arora claimed that the ruling BJP government had taken certain decisions to rectify the mistakes committed under previous Congress governments.

Azad, who was allowed to visit certain parts of Jammu and Kashmir on September 16, had said on Tuesday that there was no sign of freedom of speech in the region. He said that an atmosphere of fear prevailed in the state and the “amount of despair and distress that is present in Kashmir and Kashmiris, the same is the situation in Jammu”. He also said he would issue a statement on the visit after the end of the trip.

Prohibitory orders and an unprecedented communications blackout began in Jammu and Kashmir on August 4 with several leaders being detained or put under house arrest. A day later, the Centre scrapped the state’s special status under Article 370 of the Indian Constitution and imposed a lockdown in the region. Prohibitory orders are being lifted gradually, but the communications blockade remains in most parts.

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