Srinagar: Union Home Minister Amit Shah who is in Jammu and Kashmir on his three-day visit to the Union Territory, on the last day of his visit, yesterday paid his obeisance to Goddess Ragyna Devi at Kheer Bhawani temple in central Kashmir's Ganderbal district. He was accompanied by Lieutenant Governor Manoj Sinha and other senior officers of the Union Territory administration.
Later Home Minister Amit Shah while addressing the gathering at Sher-e-Kashmir International Convention Centre (SKICC) in Srinagar today, hit out at National Conference president Dr Farooq Abdullah for seeking talks with Pakistan. He said that the government would rather, talk to the youth and people of Jammu and Kashmir for making the Union Territory the most developed and prosperous in the country.
Amit Shah on the occasion asserted that the government is aimed at wiping out terrorism from Jammu and Kashmir and put an end to civilian killings completely and maintained that nobody would be allowed to disrupt peace and the process of development taking place in the Union Territory of Jammu and Kashmir, which has a special place in Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s heart.
The Home Minister also inaugurated a 500-bed hospital at Bemina, completed at a cost
of Rs 115 crore, laid the foundation stone for the Handwara Medical College and other road projects worth Rs 4,000 crores.
The Union Home Minister is on a three-day visit to the union territory of Jammu and Kashmir, the first time since the abrogation of Article 370 on August 5 in 2019 when the erstwhile state of Jammu and Kashmir was bifurcated into two Union Territories of Ladakh and J&K.
Earlier, while addressing a public rally at Bhagwati Nagar in Jammu yesterday, he said that a new era of development has started in Jammu and Kashmir and nobody can stop this development in the Union Territory. He also visited the forward areas at the Makwal border in Jammu with Lieutenant Governor Manoj Sinha and interacted with jawans and local residents there. He also met with the delegations of Kashmiri Pandits, Gujjar-Bakarwal and Pahari community members.
The visit of Home Minister to the Union Territory assumes significance since it has come at a time when several incidents of civilian killings by terrorists in Kashmir have created fear psychosis among non-local labourers, residents and the tourists visiting the valley from various parts of the country.