‘25% people can’t be excluded from society’, Sajad Lone seeks reconciliation with stone-pelters

Srinagar, May 9

Peoples Conference chief Sajad Gani Lone today said his party would reconcile with the youths involved in stone-pelting incidents in Kashmir and make efforts to drop the cases registered against them. “We cannot afford a system where 25 to 30 per cent of the people are kept away from society,” Lone told reporters after a rally in the Sanowari area of north Kashmir.

The Parliament, Lone said, was significant as the prime platform to address such issues. Taking aim at his opponent Omar Abdullah, he accused the NC vice-president of being favoured by New Delhi. Lone claimed that in the past elections, his workers were routinely arrested and detained, a situation that had changed, leading to Omar’s anger.

Lone said in previous elections, his workers were sent to Kathua jail after being booked under the preventive detention law, the Public Safety Act. “Today, the NC’s grievance is that why they are not being sent to Allahabad jail,” Lone said.

Accusing the NC of rigging the 1987 elections, Lone urged them to desist from “issuing certificates”. “We need not certificates from those who rigged 1987 polls,” he said. He said as the External Affairs Minister in Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee’s government, Abdullah moved capitals all across the world, stating that Kashmir was peaceful when it was not.

Lone said there was need for accountability for the NC’s 40-year rule in the region. He said his party had plans of filing an FIR, stating, “We will take action against the rigging that occurred in 1987 by registering an FIR.”