Oppn dharna in Jammu to highlight public desire for restoration of democracy in J&K: Cong

Jammu, Oct 8 (PTI) Jammu and Kashmir Congress president Vikar Rasool Wani on Sunday said the proposed dharna by opposition parties here on October 10 is meant to send the message that people want the restoration of electoral democracy in the Union territory.

Addressing a meeting of senior Congress leaders at the party headquarters in Jammu, Wani asked them to attend the proposed peaceful joint dharna likely to be held at the Maharaja Hari Singh Park.

“Although the dharna is symbolic and not a show of strength, a good number of leaders and workers will attend the protest. Sometime later, the leadership of the INDIA alliance will be invited here,” he said.

The Congress leader said the protest was planned by the opposition parties during a recently held meeting to convey the message of the immediate restoration of democracy and the democratic and constitutional rights of the people of Jammu and Kashmir, besides highlighting their “burning issues”.

“People are suffering under the bureaucratic regime for more than five years while the lieutenant governor is claiming that 80 per cent of people are happy with the present dispensation,” he said.

“In order to counter this kind of narrative, the united opposition through this peaceful dharna, wants to send a clear and loud message that the people of Jammu and Kashmir want early restoration of democracy and to have their elected government apart from other democratic and constitutional rights,” he added.

Jammu and Kashmir Congress working president Raman Bhalla said the people want immediate holding of assembly polls and the restoration of statehood besides timely urban local bodies and panchayat elections.

He claimed that the Centre and the lieutenant governor-led administration are deliberately not holding the assembly elections as they fear a backlash and defeat of the Bharatiya Janata Party