Excelsior Correspondent
Jammu, Sept 22: Stressing the supremacy of people in running democratic institutions, People’s Democratic Party (PDP) patron Mufti Mohammad Sayeed today called upon the Union Government to discipline its security establishment in their handling of Jammu and Kashmir.
Addressing a public meeting at Gadhigarh area of Gandhi Nagar Assembly segment here, he said allowing a vibrant democracy in the State would resolve half of the Kashmir problem.
Mufti said the recent reports about the Army’s intrusion into the State politics is the most embarrassing poster of our democratic system and the exposure should lead to introspection at the highest level to sort out issues of empowerment of the democratic institutions of the State. He said it is a known fact that the people of Jammu and Kashmir have always harbored a feeling that democracy has been sabotaged in the State and even when elections are held there is a tendency to manipulate these through overt and covert methods.
“Central agencies have always been viewed with suspicion for their role in electoral process and there is a general feeling that the Centre plays favourites and predetermines the outcome of elections. This is a deadly feeling and needs to be addressed seriously if we have to find a way forward in Kashmir”, he added. Mufti said the people have to understand that they can use the next elections to defeat any such designs by voting in large numbers and wisely to deny anyone a chance to affect results through manipulation or management.
Mufti said unless the will of the people of Jammu and Kashmir is accepted without reservations and their institutions are respected, the pain and suffering of the State would not end; neither would the resolution of the Kashmir problem become any easier. He said it is regrettable that during the last six and a half decades after becoming part of world’s largest democracy, the elected institutions of J&K are not allowed the same authority as in other States.
He said the people of the State and their democratic institutions have to be trusted fully and the security agencies should stop breathing down their neck, as we believe that it is the people who provide ultimate security to the country and not the other way round. “Armed forces and security agencies are essentially to assist the elected representatives in running the affairs of the State – an equation that has gone wrong in J&K and needs to be set right without delay for the good of the country”, said Mufti.
The PDP patron said the breast beating by National Conference on the recent expose lacks logic as this party has always collaborated in stifling democracy in the State. It was the National Conference that denied the opposition to even put up its candidates right from 1952 and in 1987 it resorted to unabashed rigging with the help of police and security agencies which resulted in two decade long armed resistance and strife.
He mentioned that it was during NDA regime, under the leadership of Atal Behari Vajpayee that fairest Assembly elections were held in the year 2002 and that elections were turning point in the political history of Jammu and Kashmir. “Defeat of Omar Abdullah from Ganderbal Assembly segment had restored people’s faith in democracy and democratic institutions”, he observed.
He said that even in 2008 it was the tactical rigging in Srinagar carried out with active connivance of security agencies that gave NC the numbers to lead the present coalition. “They have been the worst enemies of democratic system and the State” Mufti said about the NC.
Mufti said NC’s attempt to use the expose to cover up its atrocities and mis-governance would convince no one as the coalition Government failed to uphold the security of life and dignity. He recalled that the Government had condemned the victims of 2010 atrocities as paid agents, terrorists and drug addicts but is now trying to use the new allegations as a fig leaf to cover its disastrous performance. Even now the Government forces are killing people with impunity, Shopian, Gool and Markundal being only the latest instances and the protest against these excesses are handled with more atrocities like weeks of uninterrupted curfew, arrests and torture in custody, said Mufti.
He said the focus of PDP is to change the system and empower people and democratic institutions. The party, he said, also aimed at providing a common platform to people of all regions for a holistic development of the State, he said adding “we have to some extent succeeded in taking our message to people in all regions who had till now been kept in isolation of each other for petty political interests”. Mufti said Jammu and Kashmir has the potential to grow as the most developed State of the country but for that to happen the people have to give a decisive mandate to PDP which with a brief stint in power has established how things can be positively changed. “Give us a decisive mandate and through our inclusive, people friendly policies we will give you an empowered and developed, modern welfare state” Mufti told the audience.
The meeting was organised by A S Reen in which large number of people were present.
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