With the BJP-PDP alliance for government formation in Jammu and Kashmir formally announced on Tuesday, all eyes now rest on the common minimum programme (CMP) and how the partners will manoeuvre around contentious issues including the removal of the AFSPA and Article 370 that grants special status to the State.
The National Conference, the main opponent of the PDP, has said the alliance was a long done deal, but on Tuesday the party refrained from commenting as it was mourning the death of party veteran Sheikh Nazir Ahmed, uncle of former Chief Minister Omar Abdullah.
Reacting to the news of an impending alliance, Mr. Abdullah had earlier tweeted: “The PDP-BJP tie-up was a done deal ages ago, all this was just Mufti Syed’s grandstanding as a tough guy to undo the damage in the valley.”
He dismissed the prolonged negotiations between the two parties and said: “Only an idiot would have concluded that Mufti Syed’s drama over the last few days meant PDP-BJP were actually having difficulty joining up.”
The Congress termed the alliance an “experiment” that would need to be watched. Party spokesperson Randeep Singh Surjewala said: “The parties are yet to announce the contours of the alliance; we’d like to see what their stand is on issues like AFSPA and Article 370. Both parties have to cover a lot of ground.”
The Communist Party of India (Marxist) termed the coming together of the two parties an “unholy alliance,” pointing out how both the parties had raised completely different issues during the campaign.
A Kashmiri Pandit organisation, the Panun Kashmir, was however unequivocal in its disapproval of the alliance. The organisation deplored the coming together of the two parties. Dr. Ajay Chrungoo, chairman of the Panun Kashmir, said: “It is a deadly embrace and the BJP is committing suicide, it will go down the slope faster than it expects. It is a destructive path that the BJP has taken.”
