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“Political parties misunderstood my directive on minorities”

Union Home Minister Sushilkumar Shinde on Thursday said the Congressmen want to see Rahul Gandhi as Prime Minister and that he would lead the government of the youth in 2014.

“Very rightly he [Mr. Gandhi] has said that the leadership should go into the hands of youth… It is our desire that Rahul Gandhi becomes the Prime Minister of this great country,” he told journalists here, while welcoming the Congress vice-president’s statement on Wednesday that the government in 2014 would be that of the youth and poor.

Referring to the September 26 ‘fidayeen’ (suicide) attack at a police station and an army camp in Jammu, Mr. Shinde conceded that there were “some lapses,” which were being examined by a committee so that responsibilities could be fixed on various security agencies and corrective measures taken.

“We had information about possible infiltration attempts in the entire belt [Indo-Pak border along the Jammu sector]. We are making corrections based on our experience,” he observed.

Mr. Shinde lamented that one political party (read BJP) was unnecessarily politicising his letter to all Chief Ministers, where he had asked them to ensure that no youth from the minority communities, particularly Muslims, were wrongfully detained in terror cases.

“The Home Ministry keeps writing such letters. I wrote the letter after receiving representations from various NGOs and others which specifically made allegations of harassment of Muslim youth. We [Home Ministry] are not saying that. But political parties misunderstood it. [The directive] is applicable to all [communities].”

Referring to the situation in Uttar Pradesh, Mr. Shinde said more than 7,800 paramilitary personnel were deployed in the State to check communal riots. “The situation there was constantly reviewed. On the request of the State government, it has been decided to extend the deployment of forces,” he added.

Noting that Maoist violence had gone down, the Home Minister said: “The Left Wing Extremism (LWE)-violence has been declining since 2010. The number of incidents of violence declined from 2,213 (with 1,005 resultant deaths) in 2010 to 1,415 incidents (with 415 resultant deaths) in 2012. In the current year (up to August), there has been a 27.48 per cent reduction in such incidents (with 14.10 per cent reduction in resultant deaths) in comparison to the corresponding period in 2012,” he added.