Out of power, Mehbooba Mufti has all of a sudden found unusual pluck and doggedness that she somehow lacked while in power. Warning New Delhi of dangerous ramifications should they engineer a split in the People’s Democratic Party (PDP), Mehbooba said infighting within her party can be solved in the same way as a family caught up in a domestic feud resolves its differences.
Referring to 1987 rigged elections that left Muslim United Front (MUF) members with no option but to take to arms, she said: “But if Delhi like 1987 tried to rob rights, vote of people. If any such kind of vandalization like 1987 is done. If that happens, I understand like 1987 when one Salahudin and one Yasin Malik were born. If today any kind of…”
Without naming any political party, Mehbooba sounded like her previous self when her party emerged on the state’s political landscape in the late 1990s on the plank of soft separatism.
Mehbooba played down recent incidents within her party when her party’s four MLAs openly declared their rebellion against the party terming it as a “party of relatives”.
“There are issues in every party with each other. There are issues at home. Those (issues) can be solved,” she said.
Mehbooba cautioned Delhi against any splitting within her party She added: “without Delhi there can’t be any splitting”. Mehbooba said if any efforts are done to break her party PDP on the pattern of MUF, there would be “serious ramifications’ for it.
“My party is strong. There are problems at home which can be solved. But if in anyway Delhi tried to interfere in it, then I understand like in 1987 when people were robed off their vote. Like the way MUF was crushed from here. If any such effort is launched by Delhi people to break PDP there would be very dangerous repercussions for it,” she said.