We are not anti-national but anti-BJP: Farooq Abdullah

Srinagar: National Conference (NC) president Farooq Abdullah on Saturday said the Peoples’ Alliance for Gupkar Declaration (PAGD), which is fighting for the restoration of special status to Jammu and Kashmir, is an anti-BJP platform but not an anti-national amalgam.

“I want to tell you that this false propaganda by the BJP that the PAGD is anti-national. I want to tell them that this is not true. There is no doubt that it is anti-BJP but it is not anti-national,” he told reporters here.

The Lok Sabha member from Srinagar was elected chairman of the PAGD after the first meeting of the amalgam at the residence of PDP president Mehbooba Mufti.

Abdullah said the BJP has tried to break the federal structure through acts like abrogation of Article 370 and dividing Jammu and Kashmir into two Union Territories.

“They have tried to destroy the constitution of the country, they have tried to divide the nation, to break the federal structure which we saw what they did on August 5 last year,” the NC president said.

“I want to tell them that this (PAGD) is not an anti-national jamaat. Our aim is that people of Jammu Kashmir and Ladakh should get their rights back. That’s where our battle is, our battle is not for more than that,” he said.

Abdullah said the BJP was doing propaganda against the constituents of the PAGD in Jammu and elsewhere in the country.

“They are trying to divide us (people of Jammu Kashmir and Ladakh) in the name of religion. This attempt will not succeed. This is not a religious battle, this is a fight for our identity and for that identity, we are standing together,” he said.