Former chief minister and president of the beleaguered Peoples’ Democratic Party (PDP), Mehbooba Mufti, suffered another big jolt on Tuesday after her party’s state general secretary Surinder Choudhary, along with 108 leaders from Nowshera assembly constituency, resigned from the basic membership of the party.
Choudhary, a former MLC, was the only prominent Hindu face of the PDP in entire Jammu region.
Announcing his resignation from the party, along with other leaders including councillors in Nowshera municipal committee, panches and sarpanches, Choudhary accused the Mehbooba Mufti of deviating from the agenda of party founder and former chief minister Mufti Mohammad Sayeed.
He repeatedly invoked the words of late Sayeed and said, “Mufti Sahib used to say that Na grenade na goli se, baat banegi boli se. Can Mehbooba Mufti with her hand on her heart tell us that she is still living by the words of her late father? She has been surrounded by land mafia and drawing room politicians.”
He also said that he, along with his workers, were resigning out of their own will.
“There is no need to defame those leaving the party by dubbing them as people of agencies or doing so under the pressure of agencies or the government. We are resigning on our own and not under pressure of any agency or the government because the party leadership has drifted from the agenda of Mufti Mohammed Sayeed,” he said.
{{/usCountry}}“There is no need to defame those leaving the party by dubbing them as people of agencies or doing so under the pressure of agencies or the government. We are resigning on our own and not under pressure of any agency or the government because the party leadership has drifted from the agenda of Mufti Mohammed Sayeed,” he said.
{{/usCountry}}Choudhary said he would go back to his people in Nowshera and Sunderbani to hold parleys.
“I will go by what they tell me to do. My people are my party. Without their consent, I will not take any decision,” he added.
He was ‘annoyed’ with Mehbooba Mufti for not been given a suitable place in state body and parliamentary affairs committee recently constituted by the latter in Srinagar.
PDP’s founding member and former J&K deputy chief minister Muzaffar Baig has already parted ways with the PDP and has joined Sajad Lone’s the Peoples’ Conference.
It may be recalled here that the PDP had suffered a similar jolt last year after six of its senior leaders had quit the party.
Barely two days ahead of DDC elections in Jammu and Kashmir on November 26, the PDP had received another shocker as three senior leaders — Dhaman Bhasin, Fallail Singh and Pritam Kotwal — resigned.
On October 26, former PDP MP TS Bajwa, along with former MLC Ved Mahajan and former state secretary Choudhary Hussain Ali Wafa, had quit the party over Mehbooba Mufti’s “highly provocative” remarks against the Tricolour.