New Delhi, November 11
Ahead of the crucial winter session of Parliament, the BJP today signalled that it would corner the government on the certificate Prime Minister Manmohan Singh yesterday issued to his Pakistani counterpart in Maldives, calling the latter a “man of peace”.

“We will ask the PM in Parliament on what gives him the impression that someone who heads a state that continues to sponsor acts of terror against India is a man of peace,” former external affairs minister and BJP leader Yashwant Sinha today said.

The principal Opposition party slammed the government for heaping praises on the Pakistan premier and consistently adopting a policy that was weakening India’s fight against cross-border terrorism emanating from Pakistan.

“Our fight against cross-border terrorism has suffered and weakened as a result of the government’s policy and actions. The PM loves to give certificates. While it is fine to give such certificates in a university, it is not so in the world of diplomacy. The PM should refrain from this practice,” Sinha said, attacking Manmohan Singh for conceding considerable diplomatic space to Pakistan.

The BJP said it was debating the rule under which to raise the matter in Parliament. “We will raise this issue under an appropriate rule in both the Houses. The country has a right to know,” the BJP leader and Lok Sabha member from Hazaribagh said.

He justified his point by recalling the January 6, 2004, joint statement between the two countries where Pakistan had, for the first time, agreed to ensure that its soil would not be used for terror attacks against India. Signed in Pakistan, this declaration, Sinha said, was the second-most historic document between the two sides after the Shimla Accord.

“In 2006 during the UPA regime, our PM succumbed to Pakistan’s pressure to do away with a reference to the January 6, 2004, understanding in the joint declaration signed between the two countries. On the other hand, the Agra summit between PM Atal Behari Vajpayee and Pakistan President Pervez Musharraf during the NDA time had failed only because we insisted on a reference to the Shimla Accord in our joint statement. Pakistan was resisting that,” the former foreign minister said.