Work hard, play harder and “make lots of friends in school” – that was the advice that Leader of Opposition and Congress leader Rahul Gandhi gave to students of Christ Public School in Poonch, which lost two of its students to the indiscriminate shelling earlier this month.
Gandhi was visiting Poonch town Saturday. when cross-border tensions escalated with Pakistan in the aftermath of the April 22 Pahalgam attack and India’s retaliatory strikes in Pakistan-occupied Kashmir and Pakistan.
Among the victims of the intense shelling in Poonch town were Urba Fatima and Zain Ali, 12-year-old twins who had moved there only two months ago to be closer to their school.
“I feel very, very proud of you,” Gandhi told students at the school. “You miss your little friends. I’m very sorry about that”.
He then went on to ask the students to tell them more about the twins. “Kya kartey the…kya kheltey the…kaisa lagta tha unko (What did they do, what did they feel, how did they feel)”.
One student said they liked playing cricket and “were friendly with us”, while another said they would “keep studying and help others as well”.
Still talking to the students, Gandhi said: “Now, you feel a little bit of danger, a little frightened, but don’t worry, everything will go back to normal…Your way of responding to this should be to study really hard, play really hard and make a lot of friends in school.”
J&K Congress president Tariq Hameed Karra and other senior leaders of the party accompanied Gandhi, as did National Conference Minister Javed Rana. Gandhi also visited Gurdwara Singh Sabha, Geeta Bhawan and Zia ul Aloom – all three of which were affected by the shelling.
Over 10 people died and nearly 40 were wounded in Pakistan’s shelling in Poonch earlier this month. A teacher was killed and nearly half a dozen students were injured in the shelling at the religious school, Zia ul Aloom.
During his visit, Gandhi walked through the town to assess the damage suffered there. As he left for Srinagar, the LoP described the situation in Poonch as “bahut bari tragedy hai (It’s a huge tragedy)”. “A lot of people have died and there’s widespread damage to property,” he said, adding that he would raise some of the issues discussed in his interactions with residents of the town at the national level.
This is the LoP’s second visit to and Kashmir in this month. He previously visited Kashmir in the aftermath of the shelling.
