Many leaders of the ruling People’s Democratic Party at its Saturday meeting expressed dissent over continuation of its alliance with the BharatiyaJanata Party, saying the Agenda of the Alliance with the latter had “achieved little”.
The meeting chaired by chief minister Mehbooba Mufti, who is also the president of the party, was called to discuss political scenario in the state following outrage over the gang-rape and murder of the Kathua child, resignation of two BJP ministers from her cabinet and continuing civilian killings in Kashmir.
The dissent within the party has comes at a time when the government has drawn flak over continuing civilian killings by the forces in Kashmir at gunfight sites and outrage over rape and murder of a child in Kathua.
A senior PDP leader who attended the meeting said many party members were divided over achievements made by the coalition during the past three years.
There were some who talked about “little success” made on political front and opined it doesn’t serve any purpose to continue in coalition with the BJP.
One speaker expressed apprehensions that PDP was “losing its core ideology” in the alliance while a few others said that beyond the talk about Agenda of Alliance and dialogue and reconciliation, nothing was actually moving on the ground.
Another party leader said there was “strong deliberation” on whether the PDP and Kashmir has achieved anything out from aligning with BJP.
“Some members told the Chief Minister that the alliance wasn’t working and the Agenda of Alliance has come under question owing to its non-implementation. These members said there was no forward movement on party’s core ideology which talks about Kashmir resolution through dialogue and also when there is no end to civilian killings what purpose does this alliance serve,” said a party leader who was present in the meet.
But some senior leaders countered these dissenting views saying there was “nothing wrong in alliance” but the situation in which Kashmir was caught was the reason for little headway on political and other promises made by the alliance partners in the agenda.
A few speakers also argued that pushing for talks at a time when situation wasn’t conducive can’t serve any purpose and even cited the Prime Minister NarendraModi’s repeated outreach to Islamabad in the past.
A source said the meeting had actually been decided two days ago in the backdrop of growing anger against BJP for failing to take action against its two ministers who had attended a rally in March in support of accused in rape and murder of eight year old girl in Rassana village of Kathua.
“We discussed it today that the initial stand taken by the BJP in support of the ministers not only led to problem for the party but also put us (PDP) in trouble. But since then things have changed. The BJP has upheld the coalition dharma and taken action against the ministers,” said the party leader.
He said the meeting resolved that PDP won’t “compromise on its core ideology not even at the cost of the government”.
During the meeting the chief minister who is also PDP president instructed the party ministers and senior leaders to remain stationed at district headquarters and reach out to people.
“The idea is to start a dialogue at internal level among ourselves and then only we can talk about the dialogue at larger level,” said the party leader.