Prime Minister Narendra Modi with Jammu and Kashmir Chief Minister Mufti Sayeed.
In the middle of a raging political row over the release of Kashmiri separatist Masarat Alam from jail, the ruling BJP has reportedly warned its Jammu and Kashmir ally Mufti Mohammad Sayeed: "Mend your ways or we will end the alliance."
BJP president Amit Shah summoned party leader Nirmal Singh, who is the state's Deputy Chief Minister, and asked him to deliver a stern message to Mr Sayeed and his PDP, say sources.
The BJP reportedly said that it would not sacrifice its ideology for the sake of power. "Next time, there will be consequences," Nirmal Singh was reportedly asked to tell the PDP.
The days-old alliance between ideological opposites PDP and the BJP has been pushed to the edge by a series of controversies since the coalition government came to power on March 1.
The row over separatist Masarat Alam's release from jail on Saturday has left the Centre facing opposition attacks for the third time in two weeks. On Monday, Prime Minister Narendra Modi said that his Jammu and Kashmir ally had freed the hardliner without consulting the Centre. "I share the opposition's aakrosh (anger)," he had said in the Lok Sabha.
But letters exclusively accessed by NDTV have revealed that the decision to free Alam was taken when Jammu and Kashmir was under central rule.
In one letter, written on February 4, the state home department had flagged that a detention order against Masarat Alam had lapsed and he could not be kept in jail without any charges. No fresh charges were brought and a letter on March 4 said that Alam's preventive detention had "not been approved by the government" and he should be released.
The PDP said Union Home Minister Rajnath Singh should have known about the decision to release Alam.
"There is in the public domain a letter that the release was ordered on February 2 when there was governor's rule here, so the union home minister should know about it," said PDP's Haseeb Drabu, the Jammu and Kashmir Finance Minister.