J&K polls: 2 more leaders quit as BJP battles dissent over ticket distribution

The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) was on Saturday hit by two exits of two more leaders in the Jammu and Kashmir unit ahead of the assembly elections.

Kashmir Singh, the BJP’s Samba district president, resigned from the party’s primary membership. Opposing the candidature of former J&K minister Surjit Singh Slathia who switched over from Farooq Abdullah-led National Conference to the BJP, Singh said,”With a heavy heart, I am submitting my resignation from the primary membership of the party for which I have worked for 42 long years. I was compelled by the circumstances after the party gave ticket to a person who had come from the National Conference (NC) and vociferously opposed our ideology for decades.”

Slathia, who served as a minister in the Congress-NC coalition government headed by Omar Abdullah, joined the BJP in 2021.

Kashmir Singh, recalling his contributions to the BJP, further told PTI,”We strengthened the BJP in Samba and made numerous sacrifices to carry forward the ideology of Jana Sangh founder Syama Prasad Mukherjee and the BJP. We held demonstrations and organised strikes for the revocation of Article 370 and the ticket was given to the one who was always against our ideology and the revocation of Article 370. This is not justice with ordinary workers.”

In his resignation letter to J&K BJP chief Ravinder Raina, Singh said he will withdraw his resignation if the party replaces Slathia with a senior BJP member.

“Otherwise, I am going to take forward this struggle and file my nomination papers as an independent candidate against him,” he added.

BJYM youth leader quits party

Another BJP leader Kanav Sharma also resigned in protest against the party fielding Yudhvir Sethi from Jammu East.

Sharma, the Jammu district chief of the Bharatiya Janata Yuva Morcha, said,“Sethi is well known for his corrupt practices when his wife Priya Sethi was education minister… I hereby tender my resignation along with my team members and my team is dissolved with immediate effect.”

The assembly elections in Jammu and Kashmir, the first in 10 years, will be held on September 18, 25 and October 1. The counting of votes will take place on October 4.