PDP chief Mehbooba Mufti on Saturday reiterated her call to the BJP government for dialogue with Pakistan and the people of Jammu and Kashmir, saying that peace would be elusive as long as the Kashmir issue remained unresolved.
She called upon people to vote for the constituents of the People’s Alliance for Gukpar Declaration (PAGD) – an alliance of several parties, including the National Conference, PDP, and Communist Party of India (Marxist) – in the next assembly elections to defeat the BJP’s attempt to gain power and seal its “wrong decision” to abrogate Article 370.
“Kashmir has been awaiting a solution for the last 70 years…there will be no peace in the region until the Kashmir issue is resolved, and for that, dialogue with Pakistan and the people of Jammu and Kashmir is imperative,” the former chief minister said.
Addressing a workers’ convention in Ramban on the last day of her week-long tour of Jammu, the Peoples Democratic Party chief sought to know, “Prime Minister Narendra Modi and former Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee both visited Pakistan, but why do they (BJP) feel perturbed when we speak about it (holding dialogue with the neighboring country).”
Mehbooba alleged that the present government was only speaking the language of oppression by sending the youth to jails in and outside the union territory.
Calling out the BJP over its claims that the party had set everything right after the abrogation of Article 370, she said, “If their claim is true, what is the need to deploy 10 lakh soldiers in Kashmir?”
Asking the people to vote for the PAGD – irrespective of whether the parties form a coalition or go solo – in order to keep the saffron party out of power, she said, “The BJP wants to grab the power and put a stamp on its wrong, unconstitutional and illegal decision of August 5, 2019. We have to demonstrate maturity and use our votes to defeat their designs.”
