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Union Home Minister Rajnath Singh on Sunday said no power in the world can stop the government from resolving the Kashmir issue – and hit out at Pakistan for its "impious" activities against India.
Singh said the NDA government has given a free hand to the Army to act against terrorists and give a befitting reply to any firing from across the border in Kashmir.
Addressing a gathering in Surat district as part of the BJP's 'Gujarat Gaurav Yatra', Singh attacked Pakistan saying, it sends terrorists into India and wants to break the country.
The home minister said he has asked the Army to reply with bullets to Pakistani firing on the Kashmir border, instead of showing the "white flag" (of peace).
"We have given a free hand to the Army. I have said – you are free to act against terrorists," Singh said, adding this has resulted in a "record" number of militants being killed in Jammu and Kashmir in 2016-17.
Singh recalled how a few months after the Modi government came to power in May 2014, he had given standing orders to the BSF DG to stop the practice of showing "white flags" to Pakistan in response to their firing at the Indo-Pak border.
Singh said he came to know about the practice after he talked to the BSF chief, following news that five Indian citizens had been killed in firing by Pakistani personnel.
Singh further declared that had Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel – the country's first Deputy Prime Minister who launched a satyagraha (in support of farmers) during the British rule from Bardoli in 1928 – been allowed by Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru to act freely, India would not have been facing the Kashmir issue.
The BJP has launched the `gaurav yatra' to galvanise support ahead of the assembly elections in Gujarat. A number of BJP leaders and Union ministers have taken part in the campaign and addressed rallies.
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