Congress leader Sushilkumar Shinde revealed that he was afraid to visit the iconic Lal Chowk in Srinagar during his tenure as Union home minister. Shinde made the admission at the launch of his memoir, Five Decades in Politics, written by journalist-author Rasheed Kidwai.
Shinde said that despite public perception of his bravery, he was nervous throughout his visit to Jammu and Kashmir in 2012. "Before I became the Home Minister, I visited him (educationist Vijay Dhar). I used to ask him for advice. He advised me to not roam around but to visit Lal Chowk (in Srinagar), meet people and go around Dal Lake. That advice gave me publicity and people thought that here is a Home Minister who goes there without any fear, lekin meri fat'ti thi wo kisko bataoon? (but who do I tell that I was scared?) I told you this just to make you laugh, but an ex-Policeman can't speak like this, he said as ANI quoted.
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Shinde, who served as Maharashtra's chief minister from 2003 to 2004 and as the Union home minister from 2012 to 2014, also held positions as Governor of Andhra Pradesh and was a vice-presidential candidate for the UPA in 2002.
Shinde’s comments have drawn a sharp response from the BJP. Spokesperson Shehzad Poonawalla accused the Congress of attempting to take Jammu and Kashmir back to a state of fear. “Shinde admits he was scared of going to J&K, and today Rahul Gandhi was seen comfortably participating in the Bharat Jodo Yatra in Kashmir,” Poonawalla wrote on X. “The Congress wants to take J&K back to days of terror.”
Shinde’s remarks come ahead of the upcoming assembly elections in Jammu and Kashmir.