J&K chief minister Omar Abdullah on Saturday said that while he is satisfied with the 3-1 scoreline for the National Conference over the BJP in the Rajya Sabha elections, his party faced betrayal from some quarters at the last moment during polling on Friday.
In Rajya Sabha polls held after 10 years, the NC bagged three seats, while BJP managed one. However, BJP got 32 votes, more than its own party legislators--28-- on the fourth seat. BJP candidate Sat Sharma won from the seat.
Omar said that they have no complaints with the results. “We managed to bag three seats. We fought for fourth seat and tried to make it 4-0. As I said in my X post (on Friday), we faced betrayal from some quarters at the last moment. Almost everyone now knows the names of those who betrayed us. I don’t think it is necessary to repeat it here, but it was regrettable.”
“Those who voted for BJP should have courage to openly admit that they voted for them,” he added.
The CM, however, expressed satisfaction that all NC votes remained intact and went to the party candidates only. “I thank all those who voted in favour of the NC, especially the Congress and other colleagues. I regret those who betrayed us at the last moment. But I am satisfied that not a single NC vote went to others. All the (NC) voters showed their polling slips to our chief agent, and not a single vote of NC was wasted,” the chief minister said.
{{/usCountry}}The CM, however, expressed satisfaction that all NC votes remained intact and went to the party candidates only. “I thank all those who voted in favour of the NC, especially the Congress and other colleagues. I regret those who betrayed us at the last moment. But I am satisfied that not a single NC vote went to others. All the (NC) voters showed their polling slips to our chief agent, and not a single vote of NC was wasted,” the chief minister said.
{{/usCountry}}Asked if it was a matter of concern that the BJP secured four votes from non-BJP members, Omar said the only concern is that those MLAs who used to attend NC meetings and eat together mingled with the BJP”. Such people should show some courage and state openly that they wanted to support the BJP, he said.
Meanwhile NC president Farooq Abdullah thanked all the political parties that voted for NC, including the Peoples Democratic Party.
“Our three MPs won. All our assembly members were united and they (BJP) couldn’t break them,” he said.
Abdullah, who was flanked by three winning candidates, said that they are thankful to PDP president Mehbooba Mufti, Congress, Independent assembly members Shabir Kullay and Sheikh Khursheed and others who must have supported us. “We got 21 votes on fourth seat. We couldn’t win that seat as some people didn’t fulfil their promise. In elections such things do take place. We are happy three of our candidates won,” said Abdullah, however, ruling out any match fixing between his party and the BJP. “Before polls we were offered three seats and BJP could have got one seat. We decided to fight and got 21 votes,” he said.