The Congress on Thursday hit out at the government, accusing it of being caught “snoozing” and busy in “false bravado” and “headline management”, while the Chinese increased its military build-up in Doklam.

“It is most unfortunate that the Modi government has been caught snoozing while the Chinese have occupied the Doklam plateau, as per news reports and satellite imagery, and a planning a repeat of Doklam 2 type of face-off (sic),” Congress communications in-charge Randeep Singh Surjewala told reporters

Surjewala said the Centre should sort out the issue by conversation, persuasion and diplomacy between India, China and Bhutan. The party said it will press for a resolution of the issue through diplomatic negotiations between India, China and Bhutan.

“The BJP is so consumed in headlines management, false bravado, self-promotion that it has conveniently forgotten that serious issues of national security exist,” Surjewala said.

Surjewala said External Affairs Minister Sushma Swaraj had said in Parliament that the Doklam issue would be resolved by talks but a Chinese Foreign Ministry statement said that the “it shall continue to patrol the Doklam area through its Armed Forces”. “Does it mean exclusive rights for Chinese Army or [that] India and Bhutan would have similar rights? Is this new build-up, of Doklam 2.0, by the Chinese an implementation of its stand?” he asked.

“After accepting ‘victory’ and taking on his critics by calling them ‘pessimists’, will [Prime Minister Narendra Modi now acknowledge that there is a fresh threat to our borders now?” Surjewala said.

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