New Delhi: India on Monday categorically rejected the assertions made by the Organisation of Islamic Cooperation (OIC) on the delimitation exercise in the Union Territory of Jammu and Kashmir, and said the OIC should refrain from carrying out its “communal agenda vis-à-vis India at the behest of one country” – in reference to Pakistan. Ministry of External Affairs spokesperson Arindam Bagchi, in a statement, said: “We are dismayed that the OIC Secretariat has once again made unwarranted comments on the internal affairs of India. “As in the past, the Government of India categorically rejects the assertions made by the OIC Secretariat on the Union Territory of Jammu and Kashmir which is an integral and inalienable part of India. “OIC should refrain from carrying out its communal agenda vis-à-vis India at the behest of one country,” he said. The statement came after the OIC General Secretariat today “expressed deep concern over India’s attempts to redraw the electoral boundaries” of Jammu and Kashmir, “altering the demographic structure of the territory and violating the rights of the Kashmiri people”. The OIC urged the international community, particularly the UN Security Council, “to take immediate cognizance of the grave implications of such ‘delimitation’ exercises'”. The OIC has been consistently needling India over Kashmir and the status of minorities. On March 22 this year, India slammed the OIC for its statements and resolutions referring to Jammu and Kashmir and to India’s inadvertent missile launch that landed in Pakistan, saying it shows the “irrelevance” of the pan-Islamic body and the role of Pakistan as its manipulator. India in its statement pointed out to the “absurdity” of the OIC commenting on the treatment of minorities in India, at the provocation of Pakistan – “a serial violator of human rights”. Prior to that, on February 15 this year, India slammed the Islamic grouping comprising 57 member states for issuing “another motivated and misleading statement”, on the hijab controversy, the Haridwar hate speeches and the harassment of some Muslim women on social media sites.
