British MP of Kashmiri origin has lashed out at Prime Minister Narendra Modi on the brutal gang-rape and murder of 8-year-old child in Jammu and Kashmir’s Kathua district.
Speaking exclusively to Janta Ka Reporter’s editor-in-chief, Rifat Jawaid, the Labour MP from Birmingham Perry Barr, Khalid Mahmood said that Prime Minister Modi will not be treated with respect the next time he visits United Kingdom.
He said, “People are totally appalled by this very act. I think if Mr Modi comes here, he will not be treated with respect. He shouldn’t be treated with respect because this is abhorrent. It is not good enough for India to do that. If India wants to be an international player, then it must be acting like a democracy.”
Mahmood, who’s a five-time MP and also a Shadow Minister for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs and Europe, said that the ‘fallacy around India being the largest democracy is nonsense.’
He said, “If you are a democracy, then you have to accept the rule of law. The fallacy around India being the largest democracy is nonsense because they don’t act in a democratic way. Democracy is the rule of law, transparency and accountability. They don’t have any of that…They should have some shame at least. India is the capital of rape per se. And to allow these people to get away sends a wrong signal to all the people… That’s why quitely rightly, people across the western world are appalled on this abhorrent act. What kind of democracy is this when the women and young girls are not safe and can’t live with dignity?
“A lot of people are very annoyed, irritated and actually feel dirty in the way this has been done. To have people from the establishment carrying out and then protecting these sorts of criminals is abhorrent. India purports to be the largest democracy in the world. I don’t think any democratic actions here… I think what Mr Modi says is very minimal. That doesn’t achieve anything. If he is a man of action that he purports to be, then he should have taken stringent action straightaway.
Mahmood added that the gang-rape and murder of the 8-year-old child in Kathua was an act to suppress ‘the Kashmiri population.’
“Is this girl’s life not worth anything? Is a Muslim girl’s life in India worth anything? They’ve done this to suppress the Kashmiri population for a long time and to allow such a thing to happen sends a signal to more people that it’s okay to do that,” he asked.
Mahmood’s comments come just hours after the United Nations Secretary General’s office termed the 8-year-old child’s gang-rape and murder a ‘horrific case’ and asked the Indian government to punish the guilty.
UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres’s spokesperson Stephane Dujarric told reporters on Friday that he had seen reports about the “horrific case” of the abuse and murder of the nomadic Bakerwal community girl in Jammu and Kashmir’s Kathua.
“We very much hope that the authorities will bring the perpetrators to justice so they can be held accountable for the murder of this young girl,” he said.
