Author: IANS
Publication: Yahoo News
Date: July 13, 2008
URL: http://in.news.yahoo.com/43/20080713/818/tnl-pakistan-saudi-arabia-bankrolled-ama.html
In his first public appearance in this border
town, former chief minister Ghulam Nabi Azad Sunday accused Pakistan and Saudi
Arabia of bankrolling the parties behind the violent agitation on the Amarnath
land row.
Lashing out at all the groups that made an
'issue' of the allotment of the land to the Shri Amarnath Shrine Board (SASB)
and subsequent cancellation of the same, Azad said: 'Less than one percent
of the population of the state was involved in these agitations, which were
being carried out with money provided by Saudi Arabia and Pakistan.'
Azad was addressing a public meeting here,
first since the fall of his government July 7, when he quit office and refused
to face a trust vote in the state legislative assembly.
The Muslim-majority Kashmir Valley was rocked
by violent protests after the former Congress-led government transferred 40
hectares of forest land in south Kashmir to the SASB, the temple trust of
the Himalayan Amarnath cave shrine.
The order was later revoked July 1, which
triggered violent demonstrations in the Hindu-dominated Jammu region.
The issue also sparked political crisis in
the state after coalition partner, the Peoples Democratic Party, withdrew
its support from the Azad government.
'The whole issue was blown out of proportion
by these forces, worried over the pace of development carried out by my government
in the last less than two and a half years,' Azad told the gathering.
'This made them sleepless. They had no issue
to go to polls, so they made land to the shrine board an issue and incited
religious and regional passions of the people.'
Azad said the people in the Kashmir Valley
were also agitated because they felt that the Jammu region was getting more
attention for development. 'They could not digest this and started an agitation
to remove the government that was working for the equal development of all
regions.'
