Excelsior Correspondent
SRINAGAR, July 3: People’s Democratic Party (PDP) today hit out at the National Conference (NC) for shedding crocodile tears in the name of erosion of special status of Jammu and Kashmir, saying “it was the NC which is responsible for systematic and basic erosion of the State since 1956”.
Senior PDP leader and MLC Firdous Tak said that National Conference and its leadership was trying to create confusion among the masses by resorting to hollow rhetoric primary focusing on creating unrest in the State.
Reacting sharply to the statement of former Finance Minister Abdul Rahim Rather, the PDP legislator said those who are primary responsible for the erosion of political and financial autonomy of J&K are today projecting themselves as ‘saviours of Kashmir’.
“We don’t need a lesson on autonomy and Article 370 from the very NC leadership, which had been responsible for basic erosion of special status of J&K enshrined under Article 370 from 1956 to till date”, he said.
Whether it was 1975 Sheikh-Indra or 1986 Farooq-Rajiv Gandhi accord, the NC not only fiddled with the political and financial autonomy of the State but also trampled the unique identity of Jammu and Kashmir. The history is testimony to it,” the PDP leader said adding that the present dispensation is not committed to safeguard the special status of the State just because the opposition is insisting for it but “because the special status is an article of faith for us”.
He also complemented BJP and Union Finance Minister saying, “Despite political differences and diverse opinions the Union Government has categorically stated that it will uphold the special status of J&K while implementing GST in the State”.
Reminding the NC leadership of its wrongdoings while fiddling with the state’s financial autonomy, the MLC said that the previous National Conference-led government, in which Abdul Rahim Rather was the Finance Minister, had compromised the State’s autonomy by shifting overdraft facility from J&K Bank to the Reserve Bank of India.
Tak exhorted the people to stand unite and guard against sinister designs being perpetrated by forces inimical to the uniqueness of the State.
Follow our WhatsApp channel