Weighed down by Gupkar agenda & proposed delimitation, PDP, NC lose footing in Jammu

The newest chief to depart the NC is the social gathering’s minority cell president MK Yogi, who resigned on April 8. He accused the social gathering management of pursuing its as an alternative of strengthening the organisation.

“Having served the NC for the last 27 years, I painfully record my annoyance with its leadership for pursuing their personal agenda and not recognizing the sincere work of ground workers,” Yogi added.

Last December, outstanding Kashmiri Pandit chief Anil Dhar give up the social gathering in protest towards NC president Farooq Abdullah blaming former Governor Jagmohan for the exodus of Kashmiri Pandits from Kashmir. Dhar claimed that the previous chief minister’s assertion was an try and absolve Pakistan of its involvement in terrorism in Kashmir.

The National Conference had as soon as made inroads even in predominantly Hindu-inhabited Jammu and Samba districts by successful Assembly constituencies reminiscent of Marh, Nagrota, and Vijaypur. But most of its key leaders within the area have moved over to the BJP up to now few months, together with provincial president Devender Singh Rana; former ministers Surjit Singh Slathia, Prem Sagar Aziz, and Mushtaq Bukhari; former MLA Kamal Arora; provincial secretary Arshad Choudhary; Jammu district (Urban) president Dharamveer Singh Jamwal; Jammu district (rural-A) president Som Nath Khajuria; and members of city and rural native our bodies.

The PDP too has misplaced a number of key functionaries within the area. On April 5, its former Jammu face and outstanding Jat chief Surinder Choudhary, who had give up the social gathering final yr, converted to the BJP. Choudhary alleged the PDP had betrayed him and likewise accused social gathering president Mehbooba Mufti of pursuing a “Pakistani agenda”. In distinction, her father and former Chief Minister Mufti Mohammad Sayeed was a secular chief, the Jat chief added.

Earlier, former Rajya Sabha MP TS Bajwa, former legislator Ved Mahajan, and former state secretary Hussain A Waffa had give up the PDP in protest towards Mufti’s comment that she wouldn’t maintain the Tricolor until J&Ok obtained again its misplaced particular standing and a separate flag.

The three, who had been the social gathering’s founding members in Jammu, wrote of their two-page resignation letter in October 2020 that they felt “uncomfortable and suffocated” due to Mufti’s “undesirable utterances” that “hurt patriotic sentiments”.

A month later, the PDP’s founding leaders Dhaman Bhasin, Fallail Singh and Pritam Kotwal additionally give up the social gathering over Mufti’s resolution to turn out to be part of the Gupkar Alliance together with the NC forward of the first-ever District Development Council elections. They claimed that the PDP had turn out to be a “second fiddle” to the Abdullahs-led social gathering.

A former bureaucrat and a political analyst held the 2 events chargeable for their present predicament in Jammu. They stated the agenda of the Gupkar Alliance — which incorporates each the NC and the PDP, and was fashioned to struggle for J&K’s misplaced particular standing — was Kashmir-centric and marginalized the 2 events in an in any other case “peaceful and patriotic” Jammu division.

Apart from this, the proposed delimitation of the Assembly and Lok Sabha seats has additionally affected the NC. Its face within the Pir Panjal area and former minister Mushtaq Bukhari give up in February after the management objected to his assembly with BJP leaders over the problem of Scheduled Tribe standing for the Pahari neighborhood within the area. Paharis have been looking for the ST standing because it was granted to Gujjars and Bakarwals in 1991, resulting in reservations in jobs and seats in academic establishments for them. After the Delimitation Commission not too long ago advisable political reservation for Paharis as properly, the neighborhood’s leaders have come collectively to make a recent push on the problem.

The NC’s Jammu president and former MLA Rattan Lal Gupta informed The Indian Express that the leaders who had abandoned the social gathering did it over vested pursuits. Their exits had benefitted the NC, he added, as individuals who had been earlier sad with such leaders had been now becoming a member of the social gathering. He identified that after Bukhari’s resignation his cousin Dr Mumtaz joined the social gathering.

Agreeing that instability since 2019 had weakened the social gathering in Jammu, PDP spokesperson and former legislator Firdous Tak claimed that the Union Territory’s administration was using its vitality and sources on experiments somewhat than strengthening and restoring democratic establishments.

A senior PDP chief stated this was not the primary time the social gathering discovered itself in such a scenario, stating that the BJP had tried its greatest to engineer desertions. With Mufti touring throughout Jammu and Kashmir to apprise individuals of the social gathering’s insurance policies and applications, the PDP would re-emerge stronger, the official added.

Where others stand

Some political observers identified that not solely the 2 huge events, others such because the Congress and the Jammu Kashmir National Panthers Party (JKNPP) had additionally misplaced some leaders in current months. On April 8, former JKNPP MLAs Balwant Mankotia and Yash Pal Kundal joined the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP).

A senior AAP chief stated many senior functionaries from the Congress, the JKNPP and even the BJP had approached the social gathering not too long ago however added that the AAP had “refused to accept them”.

A senior Congress chief and former MLA, in the meantime, admitted that the social gathering was directionless within the Union Territory within the absence of efficient management. Only Ghulam Nabi Azad might rejuvenate the social gathering in J&Ok, he stated, including that if the social gathering excessive command didn’t determine on the matter quickly Congress leaders and staff would make a beeline for the AAP.