Jammu Tawi, August 31:
At least four of Ghulam Nabi Azad's official candidates who filed their nominations as Democratic Progressive Azad Party (DPAP) nominees have withdrawn their nomination papers, leaving the party directionless in the wake of Azad's decision to escape the important assembly elections in Jammu and Kashmir on “health grounds.”
All four contenders submitted their nominations from the Chenab region, previously the Doda district, which is Azad's native place. According to reports, Azad abruptly departed for New Delhi, allowing the candidates of his party to run for polls if they so desired.
Six Chenab Valley candidates have been announced by the DPAP for the three-phase 90-seat Assembly election.
Mohammad Aslam Goni, a former advocate general and key aide to Azad, has withdrawn from the election. Goni had filed papers for the Bhaderwah constituency.
Asif Ahmed Khanday (Banihal), Girdhari Lal Bhau (Ramban), and Fatima Begum (Inderwal) are the other three candidates who withdrew for the same reason. Due to Fatima Begum's withdrawal, GM Saroori, a top DPAP official who has submitted his papers as an independent this time, now has an opportunity to win the Inderwal seat. In the most recent Lok Sabha election, Saroori's seat in Udhampur was decisively defeated.
Abdul Majeed Wani, who won the Doda seat twice on a Congress ticket in 2002 and 2008 and was appointed as a minister following the elections, and Abdul Gani (Doda West), who has also chosen to run for office, are the only two DPAP candidates still in the race.
A DPAP spokesperson dismissed earlier reports that Azad will rejoin the Congress party as “rumors.”
It is important to note that many of Azad's reliable leaders had rejoined Congress two years after he founded the DPAP, isolating him.
In latest developments, senior leaders and workers inside the BJP are still revolting against the party over ticket distribution. It is purported that the leadership of the party has favored issuing tickets to “paratroopers” from the PDP, National Conference, and Congress who joined the BJP and were issued tickets in a matter of days.
Chander Mohan Sharma, a prominent veteran who has spent the last 50 years with the party, announced his resignation from the BJP on Friday. Another prominent figure has also left the party that he had spent the previous forty years affiliated with: Kashmira Singh, the district BJP president of Samba. Singh was unhappy with the BJP's choice to provide Surjeet Singh Salathia, who recently left the National Conference to become a member of the party, a ticket.
Protests and sloganeering outside the BJP office here have turned into a daily occurrence, alarming the party hierarchy.
Twenty-five contestants withdrew their candidacies on Friday, the deadline for withdrawing nomination papers for the first round of the upcoming Jammu and Kashmir Assembly elections in the 24 Assembly constituencies. As a result, 219 candidates will compete in the initial round of voting on September 18.
