PAC dissolution: Mufti didn’t keep Baig ‘in loop’

Amit Khajuria

Tribune News Service

Jammu, July 21

PDP president Mehbooba Mufti did not consult anyone, including party patron Muzaffar Hussain Baig, before dissolving the political affairs committee (PAC) of the party, say insiders.

Sources said this was a unilateral decision of Mehbooba who was perturbed by the spate of resignations of senior party colleagues and questions being raised about her leadership.

Baig, who was given the exalted position of the patron of the party a few months ago to quell the brewing revolt, was consulted neither before nor after the dissolution of the PAC, which is the apex body of the PDP of which he was among the top four founders.

The sources said Baig was in Delhi when he was conveyed the news of the dissolution of the PAC.

This has happened for the first time when a decision in the PDP has been taken by the president of the party without consulting the patron.

“As long as founder Mufti Mohammad Sayeed was the patron, the only political leader to have been in that position before Baig, all decisions were taken by consulting him. Mehbooba would always consult her father and party patron for all big or small decisions,” a source in the party said. Baig, however, was not available for a comment nor Mehbooba has said anything in this regard.