“I was wondering if you would have liked to include this in your charter of demands,” he asked the leading members of the Samiti at a function organised to felicitate them.

“I appeal to all parties to reconsider their position on Article 370. We would have supported it, had the Article helped Jammu and Kashmir address various problems afflicting it,” he said.

Rajnath added that the fund allocation in the state should be in proportion to the population in different parts of the state.

“Apart from Jammu, Ladakh, too, has been discriminated against in the state,” the BJP president said.

Exhorting the Election Commission to take “appropriate action” against political parties supporting the hoisting of Pakistani flags or waving of black flags on Independence Day, he came down heavily on those advocating the opening up of the Muzaffarabad route.

“It amounts to redrawing of national boundaries. Muzaffarabad is in Pakistan-occupied Kashmir, and a 1994 Parliament resolution is committed to winning back the territory for the country. How can we ever renege on that commitment,” he asked.

Rajnath’s assertions were in keeping with his stance as a hardliner, much like in the Delhi BJP national executive, where he first raised the demand to scarp Article 370.