Excelsior Correspondent
JAMMU, Mac 2: People’s Democratic Party (PDP) president, Mehbooba Mufti today said that NC leadership has always exploited the people and looted the State for their cheap political interests.
Had NC not betrayed the people at crucial junctures, the situation would have been totally different in the State, she said while addressing a public meeting at Marh, adding they (NC leaders) have been treating people a vote bank to remain in power.
Mehbooba said for the power’s sake they dumped ‘Raishumari’ in 1975 and aligned with BJP in 1996 after securing votes in the name of autonomy even though the latter wanted the Article 370 scrapped altogether. “In all through this, three generation of Chief Ministers from the family have sold more than dozen power projects to the NHPC only for the chair,” she said and added this is all where their politics ends.
She said the entire State is presently facing huge shortage of power and instead of putting in efforts to meet out the existing deficit, Dr Abdullah’s performance as a Minister for New and Renewable Energy in the Centre Government has been abysmal and similar to his performance as Chief Minister of the State for many times in the past. “It is all because of dismal performance of NC leaders that J&K has not benefited from the entire programme and not a single project has been taken up in the State”, she added.
Mehbooba said PDP has emerged as a viable platform to people of all the regions of J&K so that the collective interests of the State are pursued in a more democratic and creative fashion. She said the party stands for probity in the public life and it has brought an element of positivity into the State politics and provided a platform to sections of people to develop a united discourse for the overall development of J&K.
“Our emphasis will be on connecting the people rather than trying to perpetuate the traditional methods of NC to create fissures in the society,” she said, adding PDP likes to present a united voice of the State for the problems it is facing and seeking fair deal in our federal structure”.
The PDP president further said that it will be the PDP’s priority to revive the institutions of accountability, probity to make them impactful and vibrant. She said the successive NC Governments have placed a ceiling on the aspirations of people by limiting the development discourse, but it will be the PDP’s priority to take development to next level.
Expressing satisfaction at the new atmosphere of probity and demands for accountability, Mehbooba said emergence of AAP could strengthen that spirit. She said even though the performance of Arvind Kejriwal in Government was yet to be tested, PDP can genuinely claim having introduced institutionalised probity in Government and politics way back in 2003 when it streamlined the much abused recruitment process in the State.
“PDP introduced RTI Act a year before the GoI did it and established State Accountability Commission in 2005 even as the centre is trying to do so now after a nationwide campaign on the issue” said Mehbooba.
On the occasion, Yashpal Sharma, MLC, who is also PDP’s candidate for Jammu-Poonch Parliamentary constituency; Ms Shanti Devi, Thakur Suram Singh Chib, Vikram Singh Langeh, Ashok Sharma, Suman Sharma, Soorat Singh, Chaudhary Ramesh Lal, Seema Devi, Ram Lal, Vickey Sharma, Dilay Ram and Gopal Sharma and other were also present.
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