Its back might be against the wall in the Kashmir valley where it faces daily protests, but that doesn’t seem to deter the party leaders from offering moral support to the Muslims of the Jammu region. Its senior leader and a member of the State Pahari AdvisoryBoard, Tazeem Dar, accused the party’s ally, the BJP, of neglecting the Muslims.

“Muslims in Jammu region are feeling suffocated, threatened, reduced to non-entity and above all, neglected by BJP leadership especially BJP ministers of the ruling coalition. Since mandate from Jammu region is with BJP, the party is by design neglecting Muslims of Jammu region. This is dangerous and detrimental to the national interest, which BJP keeps talking about,” he said.

He added that the PDP allied with the BJP to respect mandate of the people of Jammu region but the BJP, according to him, has been playing partisan politics. “Situation in Kashmir valley and in Jammu region speaks in volumes about seriousness of BJP in dealing with issues pertaining to J&K in a positive manner,” said Dar.

Dar said that the BJP should take the path shown by the late CM Late Mufti Mohammed Sayeed of peace, prosperity and reconciliation. “Instead of focusing on development and peace, BJP is seen off and on picking up non-issues and creating problems in the smooth functioning of the coalition government. It is only honesty and integrity of Chief Minister Mehbooba Mufti that has kept the coalition intact. If sincerity of BJP is to be talked about, we would have parted ways by now. We have kept the coalition alive with our sincerity,” added Dar.

He urged the BJP to stop discriminating with Muslims of the Jammu region. “We won’t tolerate this for long. Our leadership should make BJP understand importance of redressing issues of Muslims of Jammu region. PDP leadership is doing its best to make BJP realise of truly doing Sabka Saath, Sabka Vikaas but BJP seems in no mood to heed to the repeated reprimands from our party leadership,” added Dar.

Dar applauded Chief Minister Mehbooba Mufti for standing tall and strong amid heightened tensions both in the valley and on the borders. “Unlike our predecessors, she stepped out and has been going around, meeting people and trying her level best to take the state out of the mess created by the previous regimes,” Dar said. He urged the CM to set-up a special team for looking after the concerns and issues of the people of Jammu region in general and Muslims in particular.

Guest