Srinagar: Peoples Democratic Party chief Mehbooba Mufti on Wednesday welcomed RSS functionary Dattatreya Hosabale’s remarks that there should always be a window for dialogue with Pakistan, stating that there was no other option but talks to resolve issues.
“We welcome it. It vindicates the stand of PDP, especially that of (party founder and former chief minister Mufti Mohammad) Sayeed, that if peace has to be established in Jammu and Kashmir, the window of dialogue with Pakistan has to remain open always. The negotiations should continue, as there is no other way out,” Mehbooba told reporters here.
Quoting former prime minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee’s famous statement, “You can change friends, but not neighbours”, Mufti said it was good if the RSS general secretary had stated that India needs to talk to Pakistan.
She said even the US and Israel are trying to resolve issues with Iran through talks.
“There is a small country like Iran on one side and superpowers like the US and Israel on the other. They launched so many attacks on Iran, but after all that, even they want some resolution of the issue through talks,” the PDP chief said.
A year after Operation Sindoor, when India launched military strikes on terror camps in Pakistan, “there is a realisation on both sides” that dialogue should take place, Mehbooba said.
“When the dialogue process was going on during the tenures of Manmohan Singh and Vajpayee, it had a positive impact on Jammu and Kashmir. We experienced it. There was a decline in militancy; the arrests of people and the atrocities had decreased,” she said.
The PDP president said she is aware of reports that, since the last two to three months, the process of dialogue has started between retired generals and bureaucrats of India and Pakistan in some third country. She expressed hope that the process would be put into effect so that it would have a positive impact on the atmosphere in Jammu and Kashmir.
“If this is really put into effect, it will have a positive impact on the atmosphere in Jammu and Kashmir. People will get some relief from being suspected and harassed, and called anti-national,” she added.
To a question about the ruling National Conference’s accusation that her party issued the highest number of liquor licences when it was in power, Mehbooba said the PDP government could have banned alcohol had the party enjoyed a huge majority like the National Conference does.
“PDP formed the government twice, but both times, it was an alliance. We never had such a huge majority that we could have banned alcohol if we wanted to. Today, the National Conference has around 50 MLAs. Had we enjoyed such a majority, perhaps we could have taken some step,” she said.
The PDP chief said the government need not have been dependent on revenue from liquor if National Conference president and former chief minister Farooq Abdullah had not “handed over” Jammu and Kashmir’s power projects to the National Hydroelectric Power Corporation Limited (NHPC).
“I want to tell Farooq Abdullah that our biggest source of revenue could have been our power projects, but when you were the chief minister in 1996, and Omar Abdullah was a minister in the BJP government, you handed over seven power projects to the NHPC. If we had such resources, there would have been no need for liquor shops,” she said.
Mehbooba added that Chief Minister Omar Abdullah also “handed over” two power projects to the NHPC recently, “rather than asking them to compensate for the revenue”.
“If we had these power projects, there would have been no need to have liquor shops. It would also have resolved the issues of unemployment and the provision for 200 units of free electricity,” she said.
