Srinagar, Jun 25: Apni Party president Syed Mohammad Altaf Bukhari on Wednesday accused the Jammu and Kashmir government of failing on every front.
“As a committed guardian of public interests, Apni Party will continue to keep an eye on the government’s performance, expose its failures, and ensure it is held accountable,” Bukhari said while addressing a public convention in south Kashmir’s Shopian. Several other prominent party leaders also spoke at the gathering.
He expressed his disappointment over the elected government’s performance and said this government is failing on all fronts. “Since the day this government was formed, it has only made excuses for its failures. Sometimes it claims it lacks the necessary powers; other times, it says its performance is hindered by other power centers, and so on. The fact is that the government has even failed to address even the most basic and pressing issues,” he said.
Bukhari said the traditional political parties whom people trusted and supported over the years and decades have “always ended up betraying them”.
He blamed the people for “willingly allowing themselves to be deceived by these traditional parties” and advised them to introspect and change their mindset of repeatedly placing trust in the same political parties.
“Today, we are not here to seek your votes—you have already chosen a government for five years. Yet, I urge you to introspect and ask yourselves, why do you continue to allow these traditional parties to deceive you again and again? It has been almost nine months since this government took office—has anything really changed? Has it addressed your problems?” he said.
He added, “In all these months, they have done nothing for the common people. However, when it came to increasing the salaries of their MLAs, they acted swiftly and even joined hands with the BJP to achieve this goal.”
Bukhari said the Apni Party will play the role of a chowkidar (watchman) to keep an eye on this government, identify its failures, and ensure it is held accountable.
After the convention, while speaking with reporters and responding to a question, the Apni Party chief reiterated his demand for reforms in the current reservation system. “I am not against reservations, but it is not fair that an entire family—from the grandfather down to the grandson—continues to benefit from reservation certificates. Entire families repeatedly avail jobs across generations. We need to create a judicious system to ensure there is no exploitation in the name of category, and at the same time, we must protect merit,” he said.
Addressing the occasion, party’s General Secretary Rafi Ahmad Mir urged the Union Government to engage with the people of Jammu and Kashmir to address their problems and grievances.
Addressing the convention, the party’s Provincial President Mohammad Ashraf Mir said the Apni Party has decided to expose the failures of the government.
