Amid speculations of BJP making bid at installing a Hindu chief minister in J&K, National Conference vice president and former chief minister Omar Abdullah on Monday met party workers and MLAs in Jammu.
He urged Governor Mr N. N Vohra to restore normality of 2014 that saw peaceful conduct of parliamentary and assembly elections in the State. “The situation in Kashmir is quite alarming,” he said.
Responding to BJP president Amit Shah’s remark about two Kashmir dynasties ruling the State, Mr. Abdullah said, “Will Mr. Shah justify BJP’s alliance with one of the two families after stitching alliance with Mufti Mohammed Sayeed in 2014. It was sheer opportunism and lust for power that brought to the duo, which they themselves called North Pole South Pole, together.”
In an oblique reference to the BJP;’s reported move to install a new government with the help of dissident Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) and NC MLAs, Mr. Abdullah said, “Power is not the destination for NC. Had the power been any driving force for his party, NC with 28 MLAs in 2003 and 15 MLAs in 2014 could have formed the government.”
He asked party leaders “to further intensify their public outreach programme, identify their problems and seek their redressal”.
“The past over three years’ misrule has brought miseries to people of ammu, Kashmir and Ladakh regions, who were denied justice and deprived of development and accountable administration. I wondered when Ms. Mufti seeks just one inch of the Prime Minister’s 56 inch chest for Kashmir. What stopped her in seeking justice for J&K during several visits of Mr. Modi” he said.
Referring to BJP ministers, he said, “For all this time, they (BJP ministers) preferred to be silent and now they were yelling the slogan of discrimination. Either there was something wrong in BJP’s three years silence or now they are trying to hoodwink the public opinion by believing them as fools,” he added.