Excelsior Correspondent
JAMMU, Aug 1: All India Congress Committee media incharge Randeep Singh Surjewalla and Pradesh Congress Committee president, Ghulam Ahmed Mir have alleged that PDP-BJP Coalition Government in the State was harassing the former MP and senior Congress leader Tariq Hameed Karra.
In a joint press statement, both Surjewalla and Mir alleged that in last three years, it has become clear that the BJP Government at the Centre and PDP-BJP in J&K, desperately wishes to wipe out all bastions of opposition to their uniquely poor brand of governance and administrative incompetence.
Having lodged false criminal cases against top Congress leaders like Virbhadra Singh, P. Chidambaram, Ashok Gehlot, Motilal Vora, Sachin Pilot, Bhupinder Singh Hooda and Ashok Chavan, they have now turned their attention to one of the strongest voices speaking out against their maladministration in Kashmir, former MP from Srinagar and Congress leader, Karra.
They said being founding member of PDP in 1999, Karra sought to resolve the problems of Kashmir within the framework of Indian Constitution. In 2014 elections, Karra, who belongs to a prominent political family and whose uncle was Chief Minister of the State (GM Sadiq), was elected by a significant margin as the MP from Srinagar. However in October 2014 when the PDP allied with the BJP, Karra was the first one to raise his voice against the political opportunism and betrayal of public mandate. He even withdrew from the negotiating committee, which was speaking to the BJP at the time.
On declaration of the alliance, Karra emerged as the most vocal critic of the current BJP-PDP Government, which has pushed the entire J&K in a cycle of mal-governance and violence on account of abject incompetence. The events of 2015-2016 would bear out his wisdom with the State witnessing a degree of violence and long curfews spreading across months, a deterioration of affairs.
Following Mufti Sayeed’s demise in January, 2016; Karra resigned from his seat in September, 2016 on principle and dedicated himself to exposing the insular and narrow minded agenda of the BJP-PDP Government.
In retaliation for his outspoken criticism and expose of the BJP-PDP mis-governance in the State, the PDP-BJP Government has decided to seize, illegally and without authority, a property that has been legally recognised as his ancestral land since 1950. This attempt at discrediting and harassing rivals instead of facing them in the public domain is now a well-known tactic of the BJP-PDP.
What makes this case particularly shocking is how the State Government has colluded with forgers and land grabbers to usurp the land. The State Government has also announced its intention to divert the other half of the land for ‘State purposes’. Despite multiple protections given by the High Court of Jammu and Kashmir, the BJP-PDP Government seems intent to persecute Karra while providing State support through the means of the police machinery to those illegally occupying the land. These actions of the State Govt are a poor reflection on the bankrupt political stratagems of the BJP.
Trending Now
E-Paper
Follow our WhatsApp channel