Labour Party panics after BJP’s attack

LONDON: The Labour Party has panicked on the issue of Indian Occupied Kashmir (IOK) after coming direct under pressure from the well-resourced campaign by the Indian government’s affiliates in Britain.

In what has been dubbed as foreign interference by the Indian government into the UK general elections next month, India’s ruling party Bahartiya Janata Party (BJP) has used its front organisation in the UK – the Overseas Friends of BJP (OFBJP) – to run campaign against Labour Party on at least 50 seats to sway Hindu and Indian origin voters towards the Conservative Party, after the Labour’s annual conference in September firmly stood for the right of self-determination of the people of Kashmir, condemned the revocation of Article 370 and called for the entry of international observers into the locked Kashmir.

In an open letter penned by Ian Lavery to the British Indian voters, the Labour Party chairman has said that the issue of occupied Kashmir is a bilateral matter between India and Pakistan in which the Labour Party will not interfere. One Labour MP has told this reporter that she will be writing to the Labour Party leader chairman seeking clarification on his letter.

The Labour Party chairman said in his letter that an emergency motion on Indian Occupied Kashmir passed by Labour at its annual conference had caused offence to some British Indians and India itself. He wrote, “The Labour Party is fully aware of the senilities that exist over the situation in Kashmir.

We recognise that the language used in the emergency motion has caused offence in some sections of the India diaspora and in India itself. We are adamant that the deeply felt and genuinely held differences on the issue Kashmir must not be allowed to divide communities against other here in the UK.”