It will be PDP v/s BJP in Assembly polls: Mehbooba

Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) president and parliamentarian Mehbooba Mufti Monday accused the BJP of trying to disintegrate the State and divide it on communal lines for electoral gains. She also said it would be a PDP v/s BJP contest in the upcoming Assembly elections.

Mehbooba was speaking to media persons after addressing series of roadside rallies in Dooru assembly segment of this South Kashmir district. “Congress has become very weak at the national level and at the state level too, the wrong policies of National Conference (NC)-Congress coalition government won’t go in their favor,” she said.
She said Congress’ coalition with NC has been marked by misgovernance, corruption and unemployment. “I fear BJP which is pursuing an agenda of communal hatred and disintegration of the state may emerge as the largest opposition in the state,” she said.
Mehbooba claimed that their real contest in the upcoming polls would be with the BJP. “It is for people to decide whether they want to give us decisive mandate so that we don’t have to rely on any one to form the government,” she said. “It will be PDP v/s BJP all the way.”
BJP is eyeing 40 plus seats in the state and its poll plan in Kashmir is “primarily focused” on six Assembly constituencies and the party is banking on the people supporting what they call “nationalistic viewpoint” to see through its strategy in the upcoming Assembly elections. Sopore in Baramulla district, the home constituency of separatist leader Syed Ali Geelani; Habba Kadal and Amira Kadal in Srinagar, Tral in Pulwama district and Anantnag (Islamabad) and Bijbehara constituencies in Anantnag district are at the center of the party’s Kashmir poll strategy.
Earlier in her speeches, Mehbooba while urging restoration of complete peace and ceasefire on the Line of Control (LoC) and the International Border (IB) with Pakistan, said the two countries can’t ignore the yearning for peace in JK.
“PDP wants to make it clear to the national leadership and the government of Pakistan that the people of the state would resist through all democratic means the heightening of tension between the two countries as they are the worst sufferers,” she said.