J&K BJP chief likens NC to Pakistan, gets slammed for ‘hurting national interest’ 

Ahead of Panchayat polls in Jammu and Kashmir, the state BJP president Ravinder Raina has likened National Conference (NC) with the Pakistani soldiers who surrendered before Indian military during the Bangladesh war.

Speaking to media in winter capital city on Monday, October 30, Raina said that by choosing to boycott the ongoing local body polls, state’s oldest political party has acted like “90,000 Pakistani soldiers who  had surrendered before Indian military forces in 1971 war.”

“They (NC) are surrendered (political) players now. They don’t know what (our) game plan is,” Raina told media in Jammu.

Independent observers see Raina’s statement as part of BJP’s bigger strategy ahead of 2019 Lok Sabha polls wherein it has been branding it’s ideological and political adversaries as “Pakistani” to project itself as the only patriotic party in the country.

Both major parties of the troubled state, NC and the People’s Democratic Party (PDP) had boycotted local body polls—which are being held after a gap of 13 years—over row on Article 37 A of Indian Constitution.

Sharply reacting to the statement, the NC has accused BJP of “pushing the country towards totalitarianism and making the constitution defunct.”

“They (BJP) seems to have forgotten that our party (NC) had rejected two-nation theory in 1947. Despite opposition, we allied ourselves with the Union of India through instrument of accession,” senior party leader Sheikh Mustafa Kamal told National Herald, adding that “We have lost our leaders including three ministers and workers in militancy. Our senior leaders like Farooq Abdullah and Omar Abdullah have escaped bids on their lives and they call us Pakistanis.”

Notably, just two days ahead of polling for the first phase of elections for urban local bodies, two NC workers were killed and another injured when militants fired at them from a close range in Srinagar.

Kamal further said that BJP wants Article 370 and Article 35 A to be revoked to change demographic profile of the only Muslim majority state in the country. “We had asked the Central government to make clear that the special constitutional status of the state won’t be tempered with, within the court or outside, which is why we didn’t participate in these elections,” he said, and went on to add that “the ruling party (BJP) is following narrow minded nationalism at the cost of national interest.”

Earlier, Raina also claimed that his party was poised to sweep next state assembly elections and form a government at it’s own. “The BJP will secure a resounding victory in Kashmir. We will win 50 plus seats and have a BJP chief minister in the state.”

Pertinently, in the last state assembly elections, BJP had its “Mission 44 Plus” to rid the state of the "father-son (Abdullahs), father-daughter (Muftis). But shorty after the election results were declared, it’s “mission possible” turned to be “mission impossible.” The saffron party could win only 25 seats and had to stitch an alliance with the “father-daughter party”.

Elections results of the local urban bodies in the state were announced on October 20. The Panchayat polls be held in nine phases from November 17 to December 11.