Srinagar: The Apni Party on Monday announced support to former minister Taj Mohiuddin who is contesting as an Independent candidate from the Uri assembly segment in Baramulla district.
Announcing the decision, Apni Party president Altaf Bukhari said it was done keeping in mind the interests of the people of the Uri Assembly segment.
“The Apni Party has decided to back Mohiuddin. We will lend our full support to him. There is no personal interest. Neither does Mohiuddin have any personal interest nor do I,” Bukhari said.
Bukhari said Mohiuddin is a tall leader and expressed hope that he would be elected to the assembly.
Asserting that public interest was the top priority of the Apni Party, its chief said, “In the broader interest of the people, we will not hesitate to support like-minded independent candidates wherever and whenever we find it appropriate during these elections.”
Following the Apni Party’s announcement, the PDP withdrew its support to Mohiuddin.
“In view of Apni Party extending support to Taj Mohiuddin in Uri constituency, JKPDP has decided to withdraw its support and put out the party’s own candidate,” it said in a post on X.
News agency KNO quoted PDP’s Mohammad Rafique Rather as saying that they are ideologically far apart from the Apni Party.
It has become natural for us to withdraw support after the Apni Party announced its support to Taj Mohiuddin, he said.
Reacting to PDP’s decision, Taj Mohi-ud-Din said that it was their wish to support him, and it is their wish to withdraw. “I had already informed PDP during the press conference that the Apni Party was supporting me,” he said.
Mohiuddin, who has represented the Uri seat twice in the erstwhile Jammu and Kashmir legislative assembly, recently resigned from the Ghulam Nabi Azad-led Democratic Progressive Azad party (DPAP) and had signalled a return to the Congress.
He had quit the Congress in August 2022 to support Azad after the former leader of the opposition in the Rajya Sabha parted ways with the grand old party.
However, as the NC and Congress entered into a pre-poll alliance for the Assembly elections and the Uri segment went to the Farooq Abdullah-led party NC, Mohiuddin decided to contest the seat as an Independent.
The Jammu and Kashmir Assembly elections are scheduled to be held in three phases — September 18, September 25 and October 1. The results will be announced on October 8.
