S Jaishankar
– Photo: PTI
Expansion
The Ukraine-Russia war continues and other geopolitical tensions are ongoing. External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar on Monday said that a storm is brewing and it is going to get worse. He said that in such a situation, it is very important to have safe hands to take India out of the difficult times. He said these things during a talk organized in a school run by Delhi Tamil Education Association before voting.
The audience included voters who would be voting for the first time. Jaishankar urged them to exercise their franchise and underlined that it is important to have the world in your mind while making choices. Responding to a question on the narrative being used by some politicians on Pakistan-occupied Kashmir (PoK) during the election campaign, the minister said, ‘I don’t think people are saying that PoK will be a part of India, PoK will always be a part of India. Was part of India.
External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar said, ‘PoK is currently under the control of Pakistan for reasons known to all of us. Now, what we are seeing is a lot of unrest in PoK. We can only guess why people are getting excited in PoK. One reason could be that they are seeing the progress in the Kashmir Valley and are saying that their lives are getting better, why should I be left behind – perhaps this is the reason.
His comments came in the backdrop of protests by many people in PoK against high prices of wheat flour and increased electricity bills and taxes. Recently, while addressing an election rally in Sitamarhi Lok Sabha constituency of Bihar, Union Home Minister Amit Shah said that PoK belongs to India and the country will take it back at any cost. Jaishankar said that the world is looking very difficult today because the war is going on in Ukraine. There are issues with Israel-Gaza, Israel-Iran and there are border issues with India. In the North there is the issue of cross border terrorism with China and Pakistan.
He said that there is tension in the South China Sea in Asia and as a result of all this, the economic situation in the world is very difficult. It is very important that when we look to the future, we think about how to get India out of the storm safely, there is a storm all around us. The storm is growing, it’s about to get worse. But it is absolutely important that we have safe hands, good, sensible people, to get us through a very difficult period, Jaishankar said.
