Kolkata, June 8 (IANS) The West Bengal Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) unit, on Sunday, criticised the omission of the term ‘Operation Sindoor’ in the draft motion to be moved for discussion in the Assembly this week “to condemn the killing of 26 tourists at Pahalgam in Jammu and Kashmir on April 22” and to “commend the coordinated efforts of the different wings of the Indian Armed Forces” as a retaliatory action.

The Monsoon session of the Assembly will resume on Monday and on Tuesday, the motion will be moved for a two-hour discussion.

However, the draft of the motion, which was finalised at the meeting of the Assembly’s business advisory committee, had irked the BJP, since the term “Operation Sindoor” is missing there.

“The Indian Armed Forces are the country’s pride and their successful operation against terrorist bases in Pakistan and Pakistan-Occupied Kashmir was named as ‘Operation Sindoor’. So the missing mention of the term ‘Operation Sindoor’ means an insult to the same armed forces,” said a member of the BJP’s legislative team in West Bengal.

Asked to comment on this matter, BJP’s chief whip in the state Assembly Shankar Ghosh said that those responsible for drafting the motion proposal do not have the minimum knowledge about the Indian Armed Forces and on what basis the names of the different operations by the security forces are named.

“The details of the matter will be elaborated on the floor of the House by the Leader of the Opposition Suvendu Adhikari. But all I can say is that lack of knowledge is evident from the drafting of the motion,” Ghosh added.

After the motion is moved for discussion on Tuesday, the Leader of the Opposition will rise and demand the inclusion of the term “Operation Sindoor” in the motion to pay homage to the Indian armed forces.

Since the motion would be moved by the Assembly Speaker Biman Bandopadhya himself, no one in Trinamool Congress was ready to speak on this controversy.

“Since the motion is the Assembly Speaker’s initiative, it will not be fair on our part to comment on it,” said a senior member of the state Cabinet.

The Assembly Speaker himself said the proceedings of the House cannot be conducted as per the whims of the BJP’s legislative team.

He, however, added that the BJP legislators participating in the discussion on the motion will be free to express their views on the matter.

Last month, Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee said that the name of ‘Operation Sindoor’ was politically motivated.

She also accused Prime Minister Narendra Modi of marketing the people’s sentiments over Sindoor for political gains.

Her comments attracted strong criticism from the BJP leaders, who accused the Chief Minister of echoing the narratives of Pakistan through such statements.

–IANS

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