BJP trying to make Independents win in Kashmir to form govt: Omar

National Conference (NC) vice-president Omar Abdullah on Wednesday said the BJP is trying to make independent candidates win on as many seats in Kashmir as possible in order to cobble up an alliance with them for government formation.

However, the NC leader said, the voters will not allow that to happen and "when the results will be declared, neither the BJP nor its ploys will be successful".

"It is clear, and there are media reports as well, that the BJP is trying to make as many independent candidates win from Kashmir so that they can form the government with the help of those independent candidates," Abdullah told reporters in Ganderbal after filing his nomination papers.

He was responding to a question about several independent candidates submitting nomination papers to contest the polls. Abdullah said it remains to be seen what the agenda of these independent candidates is.

"Let their papers be accepted, then we will hear about their agenda, what they want to achieve for the people of J-K and what their plan is to stop the BJP," he added.

To a question about his critics, including former party MLA Ishfaq Jabbar labelling him as an outsider, the former chief minister said the people of Ganderbal elected him three times to Parliament and once to the Assembly before.

"Let's leave that discussion. The people of Ganderbal have sent me to the Parliament thrice and also elected members as their MLA once. Jabbar became MLA only when I gave him the seat.

"If I had contested from here in 2014, then he would not have won. He knows that I left the seat for him because I had promised him so," Abdullah said.

He alleged that Jabbar did not come up to that promise and he betrayed the people of Ganderbal. "All the developmental works in Ganderbal were stopped after 2014, so, I am forced to enter the electoral fray so as to restart those works and start a new era of development in Ganderbal," Abdullah said.