NC chief Farooq Abdullah asks people to defeat forces trying to weaken J&K

SRINAGAR, April 29 (PTI) National Conference chief Farooq Abdullah Saturday asked people to defeat the forces trying to weaken Jammu and Kashmir and cautioned party functionaries against forces working against the interests of the people of the Union Territory.

Such people do not want the real representative voices of Jammu and Kashmir to take centre stage and be heard, he said while addressing party functionaries at NC headquarters here.

Abdullah claimed that having real and representative voices in place makes their “pursuit of reckless experimentation” in the region more difficult.

“It is for us to understand what the division of our voices would entail or what its results would be. Any misstep at this juncture will have far-reaching consequences,” the NC chief said.

He called for stepping up the party’s outreach to people and asked NC functionaries to knock on every door and inform people about the challenges the region faces.

“Party’s vision and mission have to reach every home. Today, we see mushrooming of political parties and leaders in every nook and corner of Kashmir. The risky political vacuum created by the decisions of August 2019 cannot be filled by such airdropped leaders.

“It is only a representative government that will meet the challenge of instilling faith in the hearts of people,” Abdullah, the Lok Sabha MP from Srinagar, said.

The BJP-led government at the Centre on August 5, 2019, revoked provisions of Article 370 of the Constitution which granted special status to Jammu and Kashmir and bifurcated it into two Union territories.