Congress leader and member of Rajya Sabha, P Chidambaram has said that External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar should resign if the Ministry of External Affairs abstained from the UN Human Rights Council vote on Sri Lanka at the insistence of Prime Minister Narendra Modi.
Speaking to , the Congress leader said, "Jaishankar must resign if the MEA has come under the pressure of PM to abstain in the vote in the UN Human Rights Council's resolution against Sri Lanka."
India had on Tuesday abstained in a vote in the United Nations Human Rights Council on a resolution regarding 'reconciliation and accountability on human rights against Sri Lanka.'
The former union minister pointed out that Jaishankar, who belongs from Tamil Nadu should respect the sentiments of the Tamil people.
Chidambaram had earlier taken to Twitter to state that people of Tamil Nadu "must punish the AIADMK- BJP alliance for this grievous blow to the interests of the Tamils."
"Though S. Jaishankar has not been elected directly by Tamil people, he has the responsibility to address the feelings and rights of the Tamil people," Chidambaram told .
He further said that Jaishankar must resign if he was forced to instruct India's representative to abstain from voting on the Sri Lanka resolution.
"If Dr S Jaishankar was forced to instruct India's representative to abstain from voting on the Sri Lanka Resolution in the UN Human Rights Council, he should resign in protest against the betrayal of Tamil interests," he said.
India, along with 13 other countries, abstained from voting at UN Human Rights Council in Geneva on the Sri Lanka resolution titled 'Promotion of Reconciliation Accountability and Human Rights in Sri Lanka'.
The resolution, however, was adopted by the council as 22 countries out of 47 voted in its favour.
The resolution was brought after the Office of the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights earlier in January released a damning report on gross rights violations in Lanka.
Meanwhile speaking about AIADMK mentioning that they would put pressure over the Central Government to not to implement CAA in Tamil Nadu, Chidambaram said, "It is amusing to say that the AIADMK, which voted in favour of the Citizenship Amendment Bill when it came up in Parliament, would remove it today. In West Bengal, BJP promised that if BJP comes to power the citizenship law will be passed in the first assembly. When both the parties contradict each other, then why are they still in alliance," he said.
Chidambaram also criticised BJP's mfesto promise to hand over the state government administered Hindu temples in Tamil Nadu into the hands of a separate board comprising Hindu scholars and saints.
Chidambaram said, "This is an unnecessary correction. Hindu temples are maintained by Hindus."
( With inputs from ANI )
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