Prashant Bhushan recants, says his remark was misconstrued

NEW DELHI: A day after his statement on Kashmir kicked up a fresh controversy, Aam Aadmi Party ( AAP) leader Prashant Bhushan clarified that his reference to a "referendum" was misconstrued to mean "plebiscite on Kashmir’s relationship with India".

Later in the day, the AAP also came out in support of Bhushan, stating that the excerpts of the leader’s interview to a television news channel were being quoted out of context and that Bhushan’s views weren’t any different from those of the party, which also believed that Kashmir is an integral party of the country.

The senior leader of the party had come under attack for reportedly advocating a referendum on army deployment in Jammu and Kashmir. Bhushan had reportedly told a television news channel on Sunday night that the deployment of armed forces in large numbers in the state must be done with the people’s wishes. The comment was criticized across the political spectrum with BJP leader Arun Jaitley leading the attack on the AAP.

On Monday, Bhushan, however, clarified that that this statement was made in the context of "considerable alienation" among the people of Kashmir, which is primarily because of the human rights excesses by the security forces and the impunity from prosecution given to them by the Armed Forces Special Powers Act or AFSPA. This, he said, does not take away from the fact that the central government is entitled deploy army for external defence and protection of minorities in the state.

"I had said impunity of AFSPA should be removed in order to win the hearts of the people of Kashmir. I further said that my personal view is that even the deployment of the armed forces in huge numbers, within Kashmir, not for external defence or to prevent infiltration but for security of the people of Kashmir, should not be done without the consent of the people of Kashmir," Bhushan said.