'Where Were 9/11, 26/11 Conspirators Found?' Trump in First Row, Modi Calls For Fight on Terror

New Delhi: Saying that the time has come for the decisive fight on terrorism, Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Sunday targeted Pakistan from the stage of the ‘Howdy, Modi’ event in Houston, Texas, as US President listened from the first row of the audience.

Addressing over 50,000 Indian-Americans, the Prime Minister defended his government’s move to revoke the special status of Jammu and Kashmir, which he said had allowed terrorism and separatism to rear its head.

Without naming Pakistan, Modi said, “Some people have problems with what India is doing. Those people are not able to tackle their country. They have made their country the place of hate. These people are those who spread terrorism,” Modi said to loud cheers from the crowd.

Asserting that the US President was standing strong in his fight against terror, Modi reminded that the perpetrators of the 9/11 attacks in the US and the 26/11 Mumbai attacks were both found in the same country.

His statement on terror emanating out of Pakistan came after the US President said that he was committed to saving innocent lives from “radical Islamist terrorism”.

Both Trump and Modi being on the same page on the fight against terror is significant as the issue will likely be the centrepiece of India’s arguments against Pakistan at the United Nation’s General Assembly meet in New York on September 27.

Pakistan will raise the Kashmir issue at the UNGA, but Trump attending the Houston rally with Trump is being seen in some quarters as an endorsement of the Indian government’s decision to effectively scrap Article 370.

Defending the move, Modi at the rally said that due to Article 370, people of Kashmir and Ladakh were not getting the benefits of development and some separatist powers were misusing it to further their own agenda.

“Our Parliament Upper house and lower house discussed it for hours and it was telecasted across the world...We (the BJP) don't have majority in upper house yet we passed it both houses with 2/3rd majority,” he said, and asked people to give a standing ovation to Indian parliamentarians for the nod to repeal Article 370 provisions.