In a scathing rejoinder to the BJP's criticism of the Congress,Union Home Minister P Chidambaram targeted BJP's prime ministerial candidate L K Advani for his handling of the Kandahar crisis and demanded an apology from Narendra Modi for his "blatant lies" regarding the 1995 Charar-e-sharif incident. Emphasising that a motivated police force with a good leadership was an imperative in fighting terror,Chidambaram said the NDA government,which had L K Advani as the Home Minister,had slashed the annual recruitment to the Indian Police Service (IPS). "Why did the NDA mysteriously slash annual recruitment to the IPS from 85 to 36 in 1998?" questioned Chidambaram,adding that this had led to a shortfall of 196 officials in the cadre which the Congress-led government was trying to overcome. Claiming that "grave and irreparable damage" had been done by this act,Chidambaram also blamed the BJP for non expansion of the paramilitary forces. "If I was the home minister,there would be no exchange of terrorists," said Chidambaram,replying to questions about his response if he was faced with a similar situation. Referring to charges by Congress spokesperson Rajiv Shukla that a sum of $ 5 crore was paid to secure the release of the Kandahar hostages,he said that there was nothing to indicate that the money had been paid. Accusing the BJP of communalising the Afzal Guru case,Chidambaram said that the BJP was viewing it from the "lens of religion". He said that the BJP,which did not carry out death sentences during its tenure,had singled out Afzal's case and went on to point out that a "convict was a convict," regardless of his religion. Chidambaram added that in India mercy petitions were being examined by "well-established but slow procedures," and the current 28 cases of death row sentences in India had to be dealt with by the established procedure. He pointed out that an accused from Tamil Nadu had been sentenced to death in 1987 and his sentence confirmed by the SC in 1988,but the BJP which came to power in 1998 did not carry out the sentence either. Meanwhile,addressing media briefings at the Congress state headquarters in Ahmedabad,Chidambaram took on Narendra Modi for his comments regarding the 1995 Charar-e-sharif incident during P V Narasimha Rao's tenure. He sought an apology from Modi for "defaming the Indian Army". Modi had accused the Indian Army of "offering biryani" to Pakistani terrorists inside the Chrar-e-Sharif shrine in Kashmir and then allowing them a safe passage to Pakistan. (With ENS Ahmedabad)
