HYDERABAD:
There is "formidable basis" for Pakistan to extradite underworld don Dawood
Ibrahim to India for trial, senior BJP leader L K Advani said on Saturday.
Welcoming Pakistan Prime
Minister Yousaf Raza Gilani's recent statement that his country would consider
deporting Dawood Ibrahim if New Delhi provides "authentic proof", the BJP leader
said it was first time that Islamabad had officially admitted that the notorious
gangster was taking shelter in their country.
"The Interpol has declared
Dawood Ibrahim as absconder and United States declared him as an international
terrorist. The Indian courts have also declared him as absconder. This is a
formidable basis for Pakistan government to carry out its promise and hand him
over to India for trial," Advani told reporters here.
Accusing the UPA government of
failing to check terrorism, he said none of the perpetrators of terror strikes
during the last four years had been brought to book and not a single case had
been fully investigated.
"The
UPA government's weak approach to fighting terrorism is guided solely by
vote-bank considerations. For its short-term electoral gains, the Congress is
making India pay a very heavy price in the form of blood of innocent citizens,"
he said.
Advani, who made a
transit halt here on his way to Karnataka on an election campaign, criticised
the Centre for failing to check large scale illegal infiltration from
Bangladesh.