Omar Abdullah takes ‘selfish’ jibe at Mehbooba Mufti during Kulgam rally

Canvassing for NC’s Anantnag-Rajouri candidate Mian Altaf, Omar Abdullah addressed two public gatherings in south Kashmir’s Shopian and Kulgam districts

National Conference vice-president Omar Abdullah launched a scathing attack on Peoples Democratic Party president Mehbooba Mufti, saying that she had joined the People’s Alliance for Gupkar Declaration and INDIA bloc to gain mandate before dubbing the party “selfish” for abandoning the alliance.

Jammu and Kashmir National Conference vice-president Omar Abdullah (HT File)

Canvassing for NC’s Anantnag-Rajouri candidate Mian Altaf, Abdullah addressed two public gatherings in south Kashmir’s Shopian and Kulgam districts.

“If Mehbooba Mufti and her party came into PAGD to defeat the Bharatiya Janata Party or represent your sentiments, then this seat would have meant nothing. By fielding its candidates, it was proved that they made the alliance not to fight the emerging situation but to get a mandate from us,” he said in Kulgam, adding the PDP was targeting NC at every gathering.

The former chief minister said NC president Farooq Abdullah had tried to bring everybody along via the PAGD, adding, “Now, we are fighting elections in the INDIA alliance with Congress and other parties. The people with ‘pen and inkpot’ (PDP) raise a finger at NC, saying we are selfish as we announced three candidates from the three seats of Kashmir. If we are selfish, are the Congress and the CPI(M), who are supporting our candidate in Anantnag, also selfish?” he questioned.

“If anybody was selfish it was ‘pen and inkpot’ people because the formula used in distributing DDC elections mandate was also used in parliamentary elections,” he said.

In Shopian, Abdullah reminded people of Mufti’s confidence in Prime Minister Narendra Modi to solve issues of Kashmir, saying, “I remember your speeches in assembly and council where you told Kashmiris that if anyone in the world can solve your issues he is Narendra Modi. Did we get anything except destruction?”

Abdullah also took a jibe at Mufti for her 2016 “milk and toffee” remark over the killings of civilians, when the then Union home minister Rajnath Singh was by her side during a press conference. “…you could have represented the sentiments of people but you taunted people here saying ‘had they gone to fetch milk or toffees’. We remember this. How you rubbed salt on our wounds,” he said.

Abdullah also castigated the railways projects cutting through apple orchards of south Kashmir, saying, “We are not against highways or railways but is it necessary that those lands through which we earn our livelihood or which are our future, you cut railway lines through them. We won’t allow the snatching away of people’s rights over their land.”