BJP govt playing politics on state’s security: Cong

Raipur, February 18, 2012

Condemning the state government for registering objection to Centre on constitution of National Counter Terrorism Centre (NCTC) to tackle terrorism, the Congress has said that Chief Minister Raman Singh was playing politics on Chhattisgarh’s peace and security matters.

“This was never expected from the ruling BJP, which despite knowing that majority’s of the state’s districts reeling under naxal terror, has opposed the formation of NCTC. The CM should have rather kept the politics aside and hailed the decision taken by the UPA government,” said the PCC president Nandkumar Patel and CLP leader Ravindra Choubey on Saturday.

Notably, the NCTC is a pet project of Union Home Minister. It is located in the Intelligence Bureau (IB) and is headed by a director. The NCTC is slated to be operational from March 1, 2012. Its operations division will be empowered to arrest and carry out searches under Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act (UAPA).

“It seems the BJP government does not want to bring down naxal violence in the state and hence decided to protest the formation of NCTC,” the duo said.

“Under India’s federal system, the state governments are responsible to maintain law and order of its domain but in Chhattisgarh, the BJP has failed to check crime and Maoist violence. Still, it is bluntly refusing to endorse the Centre’s NCTC project,” they said.

They said the Centre had always shown magnanimity in providing funds and resources to Chhattisgarh to deal naxal menace but the BJP government took least initiative in bringing peace in the state.

“Hence, the CM has no right to oppose NCTC. In fact, no state government should protest against this project as its objective is to eradicate terrorism and bring peace in the country,” they said.