BJP uses photo to back its claim of Ansari's connection with Pak journalist spying for ISI

NEW DELHI: The BJP on Friday stepped up its attack on the Congress over ex-vice president Hamid Ansari's alleged connection with a Pakistani journalist and cited a photograph of both purportedly sharing stage during a conference in India.

Pakistani journalist Nusrat Mirza has claimed that he had visited India five times during the UPA rule and passed on sensitive information collected here to his country's spy agency ISI. Mirza purportedly commented that he had visited India on Ansari's invitations and also met him.

Ansari, however, has dismissed the charge as a "litany of falsehood" and said he never met or invited the journalist.

Earlier, citing Mirza's claims that Ansari shared many "sensitive and highly classified" information with him, the BJP had accused the former vice president of inviting the Pakistani journalist to India who has claimed to have spied for the ISI.

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Addressing a press conference at the BJP headquarters on Friday, the party's national spokesperson Gaurav Bhatia showed a picture of Ansari purportedly sharing a stage with Mirza at a conference on terrorism here in 2009.

People holding constitutional posts should act responsibly and should have not shared the stage with Mirza, Bhatia said.

Hitting out at the Congress, Bhatia said intelligence clearance is required for holding such programmes and inviting dignitaries from abroad.

For a programme of someone holding a constitutional post, protocol dictates that his office gathers information about those involved in the event.

In such a situation, would it not be correct to believe that the Congress wanted a person from Pakistan to enter India and hurt its integrity, he alleged.