The Congress has asked in what capacity an “international business broker” was fixing appointments for others with India’s Prime Minister.

Referring to Madi Sharma, who identifies herself as an “international business broker” and who is reported to have organised the unofficial trip of parliamentarians from Europe to Kashmir and a meeting with Prime Minister Narendra Modi, the Congress said the issues involved were linked to national security and sovereignty.

The Opposition party asked how a broker can do what she was doing without the personal authorisation by the Prime Minister.

Congress communications chief Randeep Surjewala told a media conference: “Will the Prime Minister tell as who is Madi Sharma? What is the BJP’s connection to the Women’s Economic and Social Think Tank’ (WESTT) as also to the International Institute for Non-aligned Studies’?

“Why and in what capacity is Madi Sharma fixing an appointment with the Prime Minister for a delegation on a personal visit and why is the Government of India facilitating it? Where is the money to finance the entire visit coming from? Why has the MEA (ministry of external affairs) been completely sidelined?”

Party general secretary Priyanka Gandhi tweeted: “India’s farmers and unemployed youth do not have this facility through which they can meet Prime Minister and their concerns are heard. But yes, international business broker like Madi Sharma can proudly say ‘come to India, we will bear the expenses, we have access to the Prime Minister’s office, will arrange a meeting with the PM. How did this business broker gain access to the Prime Minister’s office?”

Surjewala said: “The Prime Minister and the BJP government should tell the nation who Madi Sharma is, who has, as early as on October 7, is writing emails to EU Members of Parliament, saying that she will fix a date and an appointment with Prime Minister of India. It is a first time that a private individual who claims to be an international business broker is fixing appointments of the Prime Minister of this country, that itself is a serious breach of national security. How can she, without proper authority given by Modiji himself, could have done so? She actually succeeded in fixing the appointment.”

Surjewala said: “Over the last three days, India witnessed an immature, ill-advised and ill-conceived PR exercise of the BJP government organised by an ‘International business broker.’ The government facilitated the trip.

“This is an insult of India’s Parliament and our democratic spirit. When our own MPs and Opposition leaders visit Kashmir, they are detained and deported from the airport.

“Also, India’s time-tested policy over last 72 years is that Kashmir is our internal issue and we will accept no interference or third party mediation of any nature from any government or group of people or organisation or any individual. Modi Government has committed the gravest sin of reversing this policy over last three days.”

Accusing the government of deliberately internationalising the Kashmir issue, Surjewala said: “The Modi government has made a spectacle of India’s diplomacy by outsourcing diplomacy to an ‘international business broker’. It is a sacrilege by introducing a third party to assess the ground situation in Kashmir. It is an affront to India’s sovereign right over Jammu and Kashmir.”

Adhir Chowdhury, the Congress leader in the Lok Sabha, also wrote to both the Prime Minister and the home minister, requesting them to send an all-party delegation to assess the situation in Kashmir in the wake of the killing of five labourers from Bengal. He also sought financial assistance to the families of the victims.