Excelsior Correspondent
JAMMU, Sept 9: Lambasting Dr Farooq Abdullah for his statement of boycotting even the Parliamentary and State elections, Brig (retd) Anil Gupta, State spokesperson of Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) said, “unable to come over the shock of ignominious defeat suffered by him in the 2014 Parliamentary elections and the drubbing received by his party National Conference (NC) in the State elections same year, Farooq has been resorting to wooing the separatists to regain the lost ground but his style of politics with frequent U-turns has failed to catapult the NC back into the political reckoning.
“This reality has dawned upon him after the search of candidates for local bodies’ elections failed to arouse any enthusiasm among his cadre while the general public was rejoicing with the prospect of return of grass root democracy,” he added.
Ever since his return from London he has been trying to emerge as a king maker on Kashmir’s political scene using all tricks at his disposal including politics of ‘black mailing’ and ‘browbeating’ the Central Government. In doing so, he has not even hesitated for a moment to play the ‘communal’ and ‘separatist’ cards. Taking Farooq to task for his theatrical speeches, Brig Gupta said, “on December 5, 2017, on the occasion of the 111th birth anniversary of his father, Sheikh Muhammad Abdullah, Farooq asked the Hurriyat leadership to unite and assured them full support in their struggle. He also exhorted his party workers to support the Hurriyat-led movement asking them not to stay out of this (separatist) movement.”
Later in the run upto the by-election to the Srinagar Parliamentary seat he crossed the red-line by supporting the seekers of “ so called Azadi”. After managing to win the election, on the occasion of 35th death anniversary of the Sheikh, he demanded release of the separatist leaders arrested by the National Investigating Agency (NIA). He also made many controversial and communally loaded statements, one of which was telling New Delhi bluntly that Pakistan Occupied Kashmir was “not its father’s property”. These statements were music to the ears of the separatists claimed Brig Gupta.
An year later on the 36th death anniversary of the Sheikh, he finally joined hands with the separatists when he announced that he will not confine the boycott of his party only to local bodies’ elections but will extend it to the Parliamentary and State elections as well. This statement of Dr Farooq merges firmly with the separatist ideology of “boycott politics”, stated Brig Gupta.
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