Excelsior Correspondent
SRINAGAR, Nov 8: Chief Minister Omar Abdullah today said that Opposition People’s Democratic Party (PDP) was “factually incorrect” in saying that he had chosen “safe” seats to contest from in the Assembly elections.
“PDP is factually incorrect that I have chosen safe seats to contest from. If that was the case, I would have chosen those seats where we had sitting MLAs who had won by the highest margins. Beerwah has a sitting MLA from PDP and we conceded a lead from Sonawar in the Parliamentary elections,” Omar said while addressing party workers here.
He said his decision to contest from Sonwar and Beerwah was a direct challenge to PDP.
“Based on these facts, my contest from Beerwah and Sonawar is a clear and direct challenge to PDP and its corrupt leadership and I am not one to look for safe seats,” he said.
The NC working president claimed that “who would know better about safe-seats than (PDP patron) Mufti Mohammad Sayeed himself, who had to find safe-seats in R S Pura and Uttar Pradesh when he couldn’t find more than a few hundred votes in Bijbehara?”
Omar asked his party workers, especially the youth activists, to go for door-to-door campaigning in Sonawar.
“Tell the people that NC is not seeking their support only for victory in Sonawar but also tell them to join us in playing a frontal role in defeating PDP’s dream of corruption and political impropriety,” he said.
A day after PDP leader Mohd Dilawar Mir was sentenced to three years in jail in a corruption case, Chief Minister Omar Abdullah today said the opposition party had evolved as “an amalgam of swindlers of all colours and shapes”.
Addressing party workers from Sonawar constituency here, Omar said “PDP had evolved as an amalgam of swindlers of all colours and shapes and the conviction of PDP general secretary by a CBI court in a case of graft yesterday showcases PDP’s true character and goal in politics”.
Omar, the National Conference working president, said PDP leaders had been found involved in “robbing everything” from rice to land to apples to forests and now to fertilizers.
“However, knowing PDP’s penchant for corruption and embezzlement, I wouldn’t be surprised if (PDP patron) Mufti (Mohammad) Sayeed and his ‘consultants on corruption’ soon find a way to embezzle atmospheric air as well,” he said.
Omar said PDP leaders have not only “stolen” rice meant for the poor and needy but also “stolen” the rice-bags meant to distribute that rice.
“Such is the outstanding caliber of PDP’s choicest new faces in politics. Lo and behold, today they have officially been honoured with a gold medal of corruption in stealing fertilizers and that is a new addition to the list of rice, windfall apples, forests and custodian land,” he said.
The Chief Minister said unlike PDP, his party holds its leaders and minister to the highest standards of honesty and accountability.
“We took concrete measures to ensure accountability and transparency in the system and took the State out of the morass of corruption that PDP’s Ministers had plunged the State into,” Omar said.
He said “today we stand here after the successful conclusion of a historic six-year term of good governance, systemic reforms and unprecedented development without any fingers having been raised at our honesty and sincerity”.
Mentioning that his Government developed 1,300 megawatts of power in the State in projects worth thousands of crores without any shades or suspicions of wrongdoing or corruption, he said PDP has not even left urea and rice when it comes to their record-breaking performance in embezzlement.
“We laid the edifice of 9,000 more megawatts of power without so much so a shadow of corruption. And as compared to this – PDP has not even left urea and rice when it comes to their record-breaking performance in embezzlement,” he said.
He alleged that “Sayeed was a master at doing the exact opposite of what he preaches”.
“A classic example of this was Sayeed’s much parroted ‘Healing Touch’ policy which turned out to be a ‘Killing Touch’ policy when he singled out and killed all those militant commanders who had declared a unilateral ceasefire and come to the talks table in Farooq Abdullah’s Government,” Omar said.
“It is none other than Sayeed who is the biggest oppressor and tormentor of the youth of Kashmir in our entire history. It was none other than Sayeed who brought AFSPA and Governor Jagmohan to the State and it was PDP that sabotaged all efforts on AFSPA revocation,” Omar said.
“When today Sayeed has unabashedly welcomed a recently retired police officer who was at the forefront of the police response in 2010 unrest into PDP, he has yet again exposed his bent of mind and ideology before the people and the people, especially the youth of this State will pay him back with equal vengeance in the coming elections,” Omar said.
“Sayeed should answer clearly how can he ever even express remorse over the loss of lives in 2010 when he has welcomed a certain SSP into his ranks,” he said.
Omar said NC was a party that believed in incentivising honesty, morality and sincerity in politics and PDP in stark contrast was a party that incentivises immorality, corruption and manipulation in politics.
“The youth of the State will answer in unambiguous terms in the coming elections that their decision is yet again against PDP’s corruption and manipulation and is a vindication of good-governance and transparency delivered by the NC,” Omar said.
Meanwhile, Omar today dubbed senior leader Sheikh Ghulam Rasool, who recently ended his 20-year association with National Conference to join PDP, as a “dead wood” and an “opportunist” who had “wasted” his six years as MLC.
“Never stops amazing me that opportunists like Sh Ghulam Rasool & Ajat (Ajatshatru Singh) only find fault with NC & its leadership when their terms R (are) finishing,” Omar tweeted.
Singh, son of former ‘Sadar-i-Riyasat’ of Jammu and Kashmir Karan Singh, is reportedly also deserting the party and joining BJP.
The Chief Minister said he was happy that the “deadwood” accumulated in the party by his father and NC president Farooq Abdullah was “clearing itself out”.
“Thank goodness some of this deadwood my father had accumulated is clearing itself out. My only regret – two wasted MLC seats for 6 years,” he said.
Rasool, a former Chief Secretary of the State and a resident of Ganderbal, resigned from the basic membership and from the Central working committee of the party on Wednesday citing “deteriorating” party affairs in his native constituency.
The resignations came days after Omar announced his candidature for the Assembly elections from two seats of Sonawar and Beerwah while skipping his family bastion of Ganderbal and giving mandate to Sheikh Ishfaq Jabbar, who had joined the party recently after deserting Congress.
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