NC has lost courage to speak for people, says PDP president

Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) president Mehbooba Mufti on Sunday claimed misdeeds and malpractices have made the ruling National Conference (NC) leadership vulnerable to a level where they are not able to negotiate anything good for the benefit of people of Jammu and Kashmir.

Addressing election rallies in the Hazratbal segment of the Srinagar Lok Sabha constituency, she said, “During his days in the NDA regime at the Centre, (NC president) Farooq Abdullah failed to persuade the Centre to start the mobile service in the state not to talk about autonomy and other things.

“But it was (PDP president) Mufti Mohammad Sayeed who made it clear to Atal Bihari Vajpayee that Kashmiris too have the right to communicate through mobile telephony, and told him everything in Kashmir should not be looked through the security prism,” she added.

Mehbooba said instead of working to build on the gains of the PDP-led government, Chief Minister Omar Abdullah has reversed everything. “Omar banned SMS, put a gag on cable TV and harassed the local press for telling the truth so many times during his more than five years of misrule,” claimed the firebrand PDP president.

She said Farooq Abdullah, “who is involved in the multi-million cricket scam” should have been in the jail if he would have been a politician from any other part of the country.