The National Conference’s acting president and Jammu and Kashmir Chief Minister, Omar Abdullah, on Monday started a series of discussions on the party’s debacle in the general election, tweeting that while he was listening to voices in the party, he also needed to hear from people. He put up his e-mail address on the microblogging site and urged people to give him feedback.
At the NC’s core group meeting, which was presided over by party patriarch Farooq Abdullah and went on for about two hours, the NC-Congress coalition’s performance was reviewed, mainly the reverses faced in the party’s traditional strongholds.
All core group members — Abdul Rahim Rahim, Choudhary Mohammad Ramzan, Mian Altaf Ahmad, Ali Mohammad Sagar, Mohammad Akbar Lone and Ajay Sadhotra — participated and discussed the key factors responsible for the electoral debacle.
The core group members reportedly expressed surprise and disappointment over the role of Congress Ministers, MLAs and senior State leaders in 10 segments in the Valley. Some of the speakers insisted that Congress supporters did not poll even a single vote in favour of the NC’s candidates.
Two of the NC’s Cabinet Ministers, insiders said, went to the extent of blaming the Congress, including its State president Saifuddin Soz, for encouraging party workers to vote for the PDP.
It was pointed out that senior Congress leaders such as Mr. Soz, Taj Mohiuddin, Ghulam Ahmad Mir, and even Congress associate member Ghulam Hassan Mir, admitted before counting that they had failed to mobilise and influence their party workers to vote for the NC.
