Jammu: Hours after former chief minister Ghulam Nabi Azad launched the ‘Democratic Azad Party’, Jammu and Kashmir Pradesh Congress Committee president Vikar Rasool Wani on Monday said his party belongs to a group of turncoats who stand exposed.
Even as over two dozen former ministers and legislators of the Congress, including ex-deputy chief minister Tara Chand have joined Azad, Wani said the Congress has started a campaign to strengthen the party at the grassroots in all the 90 constituencies and will bring young faces to ensure the defeat of those who quit the party.
During the party convention in Katra in Reasi district, the JKPCC chief also welcomed former Dogra Swabhiman Sangathan Party (DSSP) leader Bupender Singh Jamwal and his supporters into the party fold.
Jamwal was expelled by the DSSP on September 21 for “anti-party activities”.
Without naming Azad and his colleagues, Wani said, “The turncoats have announced a party and I want to tell them that they stand exposed. (Prime Minister Narendera) Modi wept for you (in Parliament) because you were close to him rather than the Congress. You have been showered with awards…”
“I know about your conspiracies against the Congress very well,” Wani, who was considered a close confidante of Azad before he quit the party in August, said.
Wani said the Congress was a “movement” and a party that believed in secularism. “This is the party whose leaders like Indira Gandhi and Rajiv Gandhi sacrificed their lives, and Rahul Gandhi is on a ‘Bharat Jodo Yatra’ to unite the country,” he added.
Asking the people to continue supporting the party, he said, “We are going to introduce young faces and you have to support them and make them win (the elections). You will not support that (Azad’s) party and the BJP which skinned the people in the country with inflation, growing unemployment, GST and demonetisation.”
Wani said the party has started a campaign to reach out to the people from Katra on the occasion of the first Navratra. “We will have rallies in all the 90 Assembly constituencies and we will emerge strong enough to defeat the opponents,” he added.
He also lashed out at Prime Minister Narendra Modi-led government and said when India got freedom from the British due to sustained struggle of the Congress, even a needle was being imported from outside the country.
“It was not Modi but the Congress which developed the country, made it a nuclear power, an economic hub and a strong military power. Since this government (BJP) came to power at the Centre, the destruction is visible everywhere,” he said.
Wani urged the people to vote taking into account their experiences with the present dispensation over the last eight years.
