India can’t solve Lanka’s political issues: BJP

7 June 2013 05:29 am

A Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP)-led team, which is currently on a tour in Sri Lanka, has told the war-ravaged Lankan Tamils that India is ready to provide the “healing touch” but it cannot be expected to solve their political problems the Indian Express reported.

The news report said that the BJP delegation which is touring Sri Lanka made these remakrs while interacting with a wide cross section of political parties and civil society in Jaffna on Wednesday.

The leader of the six member team, Rajya Sabha member Ravi Shankar Prasad, is reported to have said that India was aware that the Tamils of the Northern provinces needed a healing touch and assured them that India was with them.

However, he had made it clear that Lankan Tamils should not expect India to solve their political problems. These would have to be solved by the people themselves through participation in the domestic political processes, the Indian Express reported.

India did not have a magic wand to solve their problems he is reported to have said.

Prasad also made it clear that India saw Sri Lanka as a friendly country and would never de-stabilize it.

The six member Indian team, which has a representative of the Shiv Sena (Suresh Prabhu), an RSS official (Ram Madhav), a political commentator (Swapan Dasgupta) and a human rights activist cum advocate (Monika Arora), was presented a kaleidoscopic view of opinions in Lanka’s Tamil-speaking Northern Province. The team met pro-government and anti-government groups separately, besides top civil and military officials.

Members of the team are also reported to have shown keen interest in the issues the Tamils were facing and asked probing questions. On Thursday, the team met MPs from the Tamil National Alliance (TNA) at Hilton Hotel in Colombo.