Ex J

New Delhi, Jul 7 (UNI) Former Jammu and Kashmir Goveror Lt Gen S K Sinha, accused of being communal, today lashed out at People's Democratic Party by charging it with being a pawn in the hands of fundamentalist forces and terrorists backed by Pakistan.

In an interaction with reporters here, Gen Sinha, whose term as Jammu and Kashmir Governor ended ten days ago, said the PDP was using the issue of forest land allotment to Shri Amarnath Shrine Board (SASB) as a tool to further its interest.

''PDP MLA and then state Forest minister Qazi Mohammed Afzal had only prepared the proposal for allotment of land to SASB...their protest of the land allotment is baseless as the matter was pending for the past two years,'' he said.

Terming the exit of the Ghulam Nabi Azad government in Jammu and Kashmir as a tragedy, he said PDP has sacrificed the state's development to further its political objectives. He also termed Mr Azad as a true secularist.

He said the accusations that he was communal was baseless. ''I used the weapon of Kashmiriat to take on fundamentalist forces...even today I believe that Kashmiriat was the right tool to take on fundamentalist forces,'' he added.

UNI NAB Mir BD2058