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Katiyar, Verma booked for Kashmir speech
Jammu:
Bharatiya Janata Party leaders Vinay Katiyar and Sahib
Singh Verma were charged on Saturday with provoking people
against the rule of law after the duo announced a hefty reward
to any civilian who killed a militant in strife- torn Kashmir.
Katiyar and Verma had offered over 2000 dollars booty for
each slain rebel to hundreds of Kashmiris who had gathered
for a rally in Jammu on Friday.
In an aggressive speech, they slammed the federal ruling Congress
party for going soft on terror and alleged the Islamic militants
had spread to the rest of India and were targeting Hindu holy
sites and organizations. "If a civilian kills one or many
militants, we are not taking about the forces...and if the
police certifies that the killed person is a militant, the
Bharatiya Janata Party will reward that civilian with 100,000
rupees (2222 dollars))," Katiyar told reporters here The remarks
come in the wake of a failed rebel attack on the RSS headquarters
in Nagpur and two strikes at Hindu temples in Ayodhya and
Varanasi. But terming the remarks as provocative and inciting
communal passion, the police have filed a case against the
leaders. "The speeches that were made in public against the
government and incited the people against the government,
the two people who made them we have registered a case against
them," Mukesh Singh, Jammu's senior superintendent of police,
said.
The
BJP, meanwhile, has distanced itself from the statements saying
it does not standby any move that incites people against the
law. "The controversy that has been created, let me make it
clear that the Bharatiya Janata Party does not believe in
any move, which is against the law. The BJP does not believe
in taking the law in its hand. The party will look into the
statements by Vinay Katiyar and Sahib Singh Verma ...but we
are very clear that the BJP will never incite any person to
take up arms," Prakash Javadekar, BJP spokesman, said on Saturday.
The BJP had even taken out two chariot rides in April across
the country, accusing the Congress-led federal government
of overlooking internal security concerns.