'Latest Entrant To Club Of Distorians': Jairam Ramesh Takes Dig At Kiren Rijiju Over Nehru-J&K Debate

Taking a swipe at Union minister Kiren Rijiju over the ongoing debate on the reason behind problems in Kashmir, Congress leader Jairam Ramesh called him the ‘latest entrant to the club of Distorians’ on Sunday.

The comment came in connection with the row stirred after Rijiju, in an article, accused India’s first Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru of committing “five blunders” including ‘rejecting’ Maharaja Hari Singh’s accession request in July 1947, that he said hobbled India and created the Kashmir problem.

In the rebuttal of the Union Minister’s acquisition, the senior Congress leader claimed he spoke to a ‘BJP ideologue’ this morning about Kiren Rijiju, “the latest entrant to the club of Distorians”.

The BJP ideologue, Ramesh claimed, told him that the vilification of Nehru is one thing, but exalting Hari Singh as a hero “takes the cake”.

What Kiren Rijiju Said About Nehru and J&K History?

Union minister Rijiju on Thursday used the 75th anniversary of Jammu and Kashmir’s accession to India to slam Nehru for his “blunders” on the issue. In an article published by News18, he cited “five Nehruvian blunders”, including floating the idea of plebiscite and terming the accession provisional.

Rijiju said India is still paying the price of Nehru’s follies as he rejected Hari Singh’s accession request and pitched for some special status.

The Minister claimed that in a speech delivered in Lok Sabha on July 24, 1952, Nehru himself “conceded the facts”.

“Maharaja Hari Singh, like all other princely states wanting to join India, had approached Indian leadership in July 1947 itself for accession. A full month before India’s actual Independence. In Nehru’s own words, the question of accession “came up before us informally round about July or the middle of July”. Nehru goes on to further state that “we had contacts with the popular organization there, the National Conference, and its leaders, and we had contacts with the Maharaja’s Government also,” he wrote.

“Seven decades and generations of opportunities have been lost due to blunders of one man. However, seven decades later, history took another turn on August 5, 2019. Unlike in 1947, India First was the only guiding principle of the New India being built by Prime Minister Narendra Modi,” he added.

Countering Rijiju, Ramesh on Thursday said, “Kiren Rijiju is doing something that he and his ilk are really good at — lie, lie, and keep on lying, and hope that the lie sticks. This is the old Goebbels formula.”

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