Not an inch of India's land will be ceded to anyone: Venkaiah attacks Pak

New Delhi: In a blunt message to Pakistan,Vice President M Venkaiah Naidu on Wednesday said not a single inch of India's land will be ceded to anyone, even as the neighbouring country continues to abet terrorism in Jammu and Kashmir.

Delivering the RV Raju memorial lecture here, Naidu said no religion in the world allows terrorism but some people in the name of religion are being radicalised and pushed into terrorism.

"Terrorism is their state policy. I want to make it clear to them, not an inch of India's land will be allowed to be taken. It will never, never happen," he said in presence of Home Minister Rajnath Singh, Army chief General Bipin Rawat besides others.

Referring to the investigation against terror funding into Jammu and Kashmir, Naidu said some people were "caught naked" in the probe.

The Vice-President said no terrorist organisation can function without finances and terror funding is the oxygen on which such activities thrive.

He said painstaking investigation in the past, in India and other countries, has provided useful breakthroughs and resulted into disruption of terrorist cells.

"The recent investigations by the NIA in tracing and tracking the funding of the separatist groups and leaders have successfully disrupted the supply of funds to the separatist groups.

"This has led to a significant decrease in the incidents of terrorism as well as decline in the subversive activities being carried out by the separatists," he said at the function organised by the National Investigation Agency.

Raju was the first Director General of the NIA, a central agency empowered to deal with terror related crimes across states, which was set up in 2009 in response to the the 2008 Mumbai terror attacks.

Making it clear that India has a zero tolerance towards terrorism, Naidu said dissent in a society is always welcome but attempts to disintegrate the country in its name will not be tolerated.

He also cautioned against alleged glorification of Afzal Guru, who was convicted and hanged in the Parliament attack case, and Yakub Memon, who was also convicted and hanged for= his involvement in the 1993 serial bombings in Mumbai, saying such acts would not be tolerated.

Naidu said he hoped that the NIA would continue to focus on all the aspects of financing of terrorism and effectively disrupt the channels and networks of funding to the terrorist organisations.

On the external threats faced by the country, Naidu said India's neighbourhood remains the biggest challenge for the national security and the cross-border terrorism through both state and non-state actors has claimed thousands of innocent lives over the last three decades.

"One of our neighbouring countries continues to aid and abet acts of terrorism in India and for a long time has been trying to damage the monetary stability and economic security of India, through the production, smuggling and circulation of
counterfeit Indian currency notes," he said.

The Vice-President said the dynamics of international terrorism have changed with certain groups using cyber communication to spread their ideology.

He said this has led to a completely new era in terrorism world over, the phenomena of foreign terrorist fighters or the FTF and lone wolf attacks taking place in many parts of the world like never before.

In his address, Home Minister Rajnath Singh said due to action by the NIA against the terror funding, incidents of stone pelting in Jammu and Kashmir has come down significantly.