By IANS,
New Delhi : Home Minister P. Chidambaram Wednesday rebuffed Gujarat Chief Minister Narendra Modi for saying Pakistan-based terrorists could not have attacked Mumbai without support from within India, prompting Modi to claim he was misquoted.
“You should ask Narendra Modi and Pakistan if they are in contact with each other,” Chidambaram said here, while explaining what he thought of Modi’s remark. The minister refused to elaborate.
Modi was quick to react. “I only meant to say if Pakistan had planned such a big attack, it may well have got some assistance locally. The government should also keep this in mind,” Modi told the media.
He claimed he was quoted out of context.
The chief minister, speaking at the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) national executive meeting in Nagpur Sunday, had said: “Such a big terror attack on India cannot take place without local help. Any ordinary or simple person will say that.”
The Pakistan media used Modi’s remarks to insist that the 26/11 terror attacks that killed 170 people in Mumbai were abetted by what it said were alienated Indian Muslims.
Modi’s statement stood out against repeated assertions by New Delhi that elements in Pakistan were responsible for the Mumbai atrocity.