PAGD members question top leadership over proxy candidates in DDC polls

Sources within the PAGD said after winning more than 110 DDC seats, mostly by the NC, the alliance, headed by Farooq Abdullah, hasn’t held a meeting

Several top leaders of the Peoples Alliance for Gupkar Declaration (PAGD) have demanded action against candidates who contested the District Development Council polls as independents across multiple constituencies in J&K, in defiance of the PAGD diktat.

Representational image.

Two senior Peoples Conference (PC) leaders, party general secretary Imran Reza Ansari and vice-president Abdul Gani Vakil and the Peoples Democratic Party Rajya Sabha MP Fayaz Mir questioned the PAGD leadership about the lack of action against those who defied PAGD diktak and contested as independent candidates and won the elections by defeating the official PAGD candidates.

PDP MP Fayaz Mir said, “I will be revealing all details later.”

Imran Reza Ansari recently wrote a to PC chairman Sajjad Lone informing him that they are being questioned by their workers and people about proxy candidates fielded by National Conference (NC). Similar allegations were raised by PC vice-president, Abdul Gani Vakil blaming the PAGD for failing to take action against the leaders who contested polls against the PAGD.

NC leader Bashaarat Bukhari also asked the top leadership for a roadmap .

“Senior leaders should desist from expressing grievances publicly. The best forum to discuss any grievances is the forum within the party. The dividing line between airing grievances publicly and indiscipline is very thin,” tweeted PC from its official handle.

Sources within the PAGD said after winning more than 110 DDC seats, mostly by the NC, the PAGD, which is headed by Farooq Abdullah, hasn’t held a meeting. The leadership hasn’t even finalised a strategy to select candidates for the post of president and vice-president of DDC councils.

In the eight-phase DDC elections — the first such exercise in J&K and also the first major election in the region sinceArticle 370 was nullified on August 5, 2019— the PAGD, a two-month-old bloc which includes regional powerhouses National Conference and the Peoples Democratic Party, took the pole position by bagging an impressive 110 seats of the total 280 across the Union Territory’s 20 districts (14 seats each).