‘Party sold self-rule to highest bidders in Nagpur’
National Conference (NC) Monday said PDP had sold its self-rule document to the highest bidders in Nagpur in lieu of power in J&K and had hence lost the right to even talk about the Kashmir Issue.
National Conference Provincial President Nasir Aslam Wani lashed out at PDP for continuing in its shameless efforts to mislead the people of the State by still having the audacity to comment on autonomy while it was a long established fact that PDP’s patrons and leaders had played an active role in eroding J&K’s autonomy throughout their political careers.
In a statement issued here Wani said National Conference didn’t require any ‘sermons from the saboteurs and violators’ of the State’s Autonomy and Special Status and that PDP should rather tender an unconditional apology to the people of J&K for abandoning its election-time slogans of dual currency, ‘self-rule’, return of power projects and revocation of the Armed Forces Special Powers Act (AFSPA).
“What happened to PDP’s ‘self-rule’ document? The Party President herself who is now the Chief Minister is on record for having promised that PDP would seek the complete revocation of AFSPA as soon as it came to power. What happened to that demand? They promised they would ensure the return of power projects from NHPC. Then when in power PDP shamelessly voted against a resolution proposed in the Legislative Council by National Conference that sought the return of power projects. They have bartered every single political promise just so that Late Mufti Sahab and then Mehbooba Mufti could sit in the Chief Minister’s chair,” NC said in the statement.
“Before demonstrating its shamelessness to question NC’s commitment for the restoration of Autonomy, PDP should introspect and remember how its patrons and present-day ‘leaders’ were hand-in-glove with New Delhi while Autonomy was being eroded from 1953 to 1975. Late Mufti Sahab was a part of those pliant, surrogate regimes in the State that crawled when asked to bend by New Delhi. He was a part of those State Cabinets that approved the dilution of the State’s Autonomy while Sher-e-Kashmir Sheikh Mohammad Abdullah and countless NC stalwarts were languishing in jails for their struggle to safeguard the aspirations and interests of the State and its people. PDP General Secretary should first answer why Mufti Sahab chose to be an active architect in almost every single political onslaught on the State’s Autonomy”, the statement further stated.
The NC Provincial President lashed out at PDP for violating the sanctity of its mandate by aligning with the same party against whom it sought votes during the previous Assembly and Parliament elections.
“During her election campaign, Mehbooba Mufti herself said the people of J&K would never accept BJP and no amount of money could make BJP palatable in the State. Today, in order to curry political favours for herself from the Prime Minister, the same Mehbooba Mufti ridiculed and denigrated the entire Muslim World and Pakistan in particular by generalizing all Muslim nations as strive-ridden savage societies. Then she goes on to talk about Indo-Pak friendship the next day. If Mehbooba Mufti thinks Pakistan is a failed State and has no hope to offer, why is she now asking for Indo-Pak friendship? It seems her speech in Katra had to be vetted by the RSS and now she wants to get in some amount of damage-control to save her party from the wrath of the people. Sadly, the people of J&K have realized that PDP can stoop to any level of lies and melodrama to attain political power and that’s why their complete political rout is inevitable”, the NC leaders added.
The National Conference leaders also advised the PDP General Secretary and his party to focus on which seat they would request their alliance partner to vacate from Jammu for Mehbooba Mufti so that she could gain admission to the Legislative Assembly. “Rather than deflecting the responsibility for shamelessly running away from the Anantnag assembly seat by-election, PDP is issuing statements that defy both its own history, that of its patron leaders and also its present state of ruin and disintegration. The party is split in half internally and is on the brink of chaos and disarray. The Chief Minister has proven to be a complete failure in dispensing her basic duties as was evident in how she continued to go from the door of one BJP leader to that of another in New Delhi to save her own chair while youth in Handwara and Kupwara lost their lives”, the statement said.
