PC rejoices over year free of terror

Home Minister P Chidambaram on Friday said there has been no terror incidents in the country so far this year and even insurgency-hit Jammu and Kashmir has remained peaceful.

“All of us should rejoice and pray that peace in Kashmir is durable,” the Home Minister said, adding that “the country needs to be vigilant to foil terror threats.”

In Jammu and Kashmir, he said, seven civilians and six security personnels were killed in 2012. “The figures are in single digits, while number was in hundreds four or five years ago,” Chidambaram said.

 Jammu and Kashmir has witnessed a boom in tourism sector as already nine lakh tourists have visited the state this year, he said. “Let me touch wood at the same time,” Chidambaram, flanked by senior Cabinet ministers Ambika Soni and Pawan Kumar Bansal, told newspersons here on Friday. He was here to participate in the 26th meeting of the Northern Zonal Council. “By no mean terror threat is over. We have to be vigilant,” he said.

At the same time, Chidambaram expressed concern over developments in the Maoist-hit states. He said Chhattisgarh, Jharkhand and Odhisa were badly affected, while the problem has remarkably receded in Andhra Pradesh and West Bengal.

“We are following a two-pronged strategy, that of development and police action to deal with this problem,” he said. Speaking on the situation in Punjab, he said that the threat of terrorism still exists.

No place for diktats

Reacting to the issue of diktats by Khap panchayats in UP, where love marriages have been banned and women below 40 years barred from going out for shopping and using mobile phones outside their homes, the Home Minister “there was no place for such diktats in a democratic society.” “If such a diktat is being issued in Bagpat, I would expect the state government to instruct the police authorities to ensure that nobody comes to harm for violating that diktat,” he said.

“There are laws relating to obscenity. Those laws have to be obeyed. I don't think anyone can say what a boy-girl should wear and how they should talk to each other,” he held.