Don't engage pre-1953 arrangement of J&K: Advani

New Delhi: BJP on Thursday warned the government against any attempt made under international pressure to enforce the pre-1953 arrangement in Jammu and Kashmir which gave the state a separate Constitution and flag, saying this would lead to a forceful agitation across India.

"I have given repeated warnings to the Indian government whenever we have felt that under international pressure the government is thinking of an agreement on Kashmir. Sometimes we get information that informally an agreement has been reached...," Advani said at a BJP rally.

He warned that BJP would take to the streets more vociferously than the erstwhile Bhartiya Jan Sangh did in 1953 when its founder Shyama Prasad Mookerjee died under mysterious circumstances in a Kashmir jail while opposing the special provisions for the border state.

Advani's comments have come at a time when the Foreign Secretary-level talks are being held in Islamabad between India and Pakistan. Kashmir is likely to figure in the dialogue on Friday.

"I want to tell the government that Bhartiya Jan Sangh had engaged in such a forceful agitation then. Mookerjee had challenged the government and sacrificed his life in the process," Advani said.

BJP is opposed to any special constitutional provisions for Jammu and Kashmir and also believes that Pakistan-Occupied Kashmir is a part of Indian territory.

"Today when the BJP is widely spread across the country then any agreement on Kashmir which takes a u-turn to back to pre-1953 situation would lead to such a forceful agitation in the country that nobody could have imagined," Advani claimed.

Advani criticised India's first Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru for the Kashmir problem and insisted that it has not been solved since independence due to him.

"Of the 562 princely states at the time of independence, Nehru told Sardar Patel (then Home Minister) that he will take care of one of these, Kashmir. While all the 561 states were integrated, there is only one which was not fully integrated... where some problem or the other keeps occurring," Advani said.

He maintained that some people jokingly say that the biggest gift Nehru gave to the country was the problem of Kashmir.

Advani further said that though Nehru had then claimed that Article 370- conferring special status to Jammu and Kashmir- was a temporary provision, it was still in existence.

He claimed that a lack of foresight, courage and determination on the part of the government is responsible for the continuance of the Kashmir problem.