Excelsior Correspondent
JAMMU, Sept 4: Over a dozen Other Backward Class (OBC) leaders/activists of Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) who served the party for 20 years joined J&K Apni Party in presence of its president Mohd Altaf Bukhari here today.
“We were disappointed with the negligent attitude of the BJP towards the OBC community as they failed to fulfill their commitments,” said Jagdish Raj Pandey. He was in BJP as National Executive Member, OBC Morch and the member of State Working Committee of OBC Morcha.
Besides Bukhari, several other senior JKAP leaders including Dilawar Mir, Vijay Bakaya, Vikram Malhotra, Manjit Singh, Syed Asgar Ali, Namrta Sharma, Bodh Raj Bhagat and Shanker Singh Chib were present on the occasion.
Panday was accompanied by senior leaders Lakhan Paul, Mangal Dass, Jagdev Raj, Madan Lal, Labba Ram and others.
Speaking on the occasion Pandey said that they have worked with BJP and supported the party in all elections but they have miserably failed to come upto the expectation of the people from the community.
“The OBC community is one of the most backward in Jammu and Kashmir and they need political and Government support for their upliftment which remained missing for the last many years,” he said.
“We had realized that the BJP will not be able to fulfill the demands of the OBC. It was the failure of BJP which compelled it to join JKAP. The JKAP has assured that all the central benefits will be extended to the community in Jammu and Kashmir, said Pandey.
He demanded that the community should be given 27% reservation in Jammu and Kashmir like the rest of the States in the country. He demanded that the community should be given political reservation and only OBC certificates should be made, not Other Social Caste (OSC).
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