New Delhi: In a veiled attack on the students who allegedly raised ‘anti-national’ slogans in JNU, Minister of State in the Prime Minister’s Office (PMO) Jitendra Singh on Monday said that they should express remorse and repentance over the loss of Indian soldiers before agitating and questioning India’s integrity.
While expressing his sorrow over the loss of soldiers in the ongoing encounter in Jammu and Kashmir’s Pampore District, Singh said, “For how long these serial losses of soldiers will go on? How long will this serial loss of young patriots, who are so precious to any country, go on? Is there any realization or remorse or repentance on the part of those who are out on streets, agitating and protesting for what they describe as right to question, very existence of mother India and its integrity?”
“Do they ever realize that they are alive and are in a position to speak in this tone because Tushar, Pawan and other youngsters are laying down their lives to ensure that some of the others stay alive to put a question mark on mother India?” he added.
The Minister also asserted that it was time for the people of this country to draw a bottom line.
Singh’s reaction comes in the wake of the JNU event on February 9, where ‘anti-national’ and ‘anti-India’ slogans were allegedly raised in support of 2001 Parliament attack convict Afzal Guru.
Meanwhile, five students from JNU, who were being looked for by the police in connection with making ‘anti-national’ statements at the campus earlier, surfaced at the varsity last night, including Umar Khalid.
The five students Umar Khalid, Anirban Bhattacharya, Rama Naga, Ashutosh Kumar and Anant Prakash had gone missing from the campus since February 12 after JNU Students Union president leader Kanhaiya Kumar was arrested in a sedition case. (ANI)