Neha
JAMMU, Sept 9: President of National Conference (NC) and Union Minister Farooq Abdullah on Sunday did some plain-speaking and admitted that his party, which was once very powerful in the state, had lost its sheen and appeal to a considerable extent. He said the results to the recently-held elections to the Ladakh Autonomous Hill Development Council Kargil did not augur well for the future of the party.
While making an announcement that the NC will opt out of the race to form the council in Kargil, Farooq Abdullah reflected on the causes leading to the humiliating defeat of the party in the Kargil elections. He said that it was not the Congress which won the people's mandate, but it was the NC which lost the election because of its own follies. The NC "lost the elections due to "its own people" and it should accept the verdict," he said.
"Our own people did wrong there and that is why we lost the elections. Now, we should accept that but do not worry, elections will come again," he said while addressing party workers after paying tributes to NC founder Sheikh Mohammad Abdullah on his death anniversary at Hazratbal. "They (party men) were flying high that we will win in Kargil, but we have not. So, we have to be cautious and not let it happen in the 2014 elections," he also said, and added that "his party men will 'learn" from the mistakes' and do better in the 2014 Assembly elections".
The message of Farooq Abdullah to his party men was loud and clear and the message was that the NC will commit a grave political blunder if it continued to take the people of the state for a ride. The most notable aspect of his whole formulation was that if the NC could lose election in Kargil, its known pocket borough, it would lose the Assembly elections as well if it failed to retrospect and find what went wrong in Kargil. To be more precise, he questioned the style of functioning of Omar Abdullah and held mis-governance responsible for the defeat of the NC. Indeed, he talked tough. But the question is: Will Omar Abdullah and his advisors learn lesson from the Kargil defeat? The answer is a big NO. |
