Jammu-Kashmir Assembly Elections 2024: In a major setback for the former chief minister of Jammu-Kashmir, Ghulam Nabi Azad, former legislator and senior leader Taj Mohiuddin resigned from Democratic Progressive Azad Party (DPAP) today (August 17).
The development comes a day after the Election Commission (EC) announced the schedule for assembly polls in Jammu and Kashmir. In August 2022, Taj Mohiuddin resigned from the basic membership of Congress in support of former chief minister Ghulam Nabi Azad. He later joined Azad-led DPAP.
Former Jammu and Kashmir minister Taj Mohiuddin announced his resignation from the Ghulam Nabi Azad-led DPAP to rejoin the Congress.
"I will rejoin Congress in a few days. Azad Sahab gave me a lot of respect, but perhaps people didn’t accept us in these elections (Lok Sabha elections 2024). I want him (Ghulam Nabi Azad) too to return to Congress, I will be very happy," confirmed Former Jammu and Kashmir minister Taj Mohiuddin.
Taj Mohiuddin to rejoin Congress
"I have resigned from the Democratic Progressive Azad Party (DPAP)," Mohiuddin told media. He said he would rejoin the Congress, with which he had been associated for more than four decades, in a few days. "I have intentions of 'ghar wapsi (homecoming)' but there was no question of doing it until I could ask my workers. Now, my workers have told me in unison to do it. So, I am doing 'ghar wapsi' very soon," he said.
Asked about his reasons for leaving the DPAP, Mohiuddin said he had been with the Congress for about 45 years and his workers associated him only with the grand old party and its symbol.
"My workers asked me to rejoin the Congress, so I decided to leave the DPAP and rejoin the Congress," he added.
A former legislator from the Uri assembly segment in north Kashmir's Baramulla district, Mohiuddin resigned from the Congress in August 2022 in support of Azad. He later joined the Azad-led party.
3-phase J-K elections from September 18, counting on October 4
Assembly elections will be held in Jammu and Kashmir after a decade in three phases from September 18, setting the stage for the people of the union territory to elect a government after the scrapping of Article 370 in 2019.
The two assembly elections will be the first popularity test for the BJP and the INDIA bloc following the Lok Sabha polls. The three-phase elections to the 90-member Jammu and Kashmir assembly will be held on September 18, September 25 and October 1, Chief Election Commissioner (CEC) Rajiv Kumar told media in the presence of Election Commissioners Gyanesh Kumar and Sukhbir Singh Sandhu.
After suffering reverses in the Lok Sabha polls, including in Haryana, the BJP is keen to regain political momentum by retaining power in the state and putting up a strong show in Jammu and Kashmir, where its strongholds have been traditionally confined to the Jammu division.
The Congress, however, is hoping to continue with its political revival by toppling the BJP from power in Haryana after 10 years and inflicting losses on its rival in the Jammu region where the two parties are the main contestants.
Two regional parties, the National Conference and PDP, have won most of the seats in the Kashmir valley between them in past elections. Both parties are part of the INDIA bloc along with the Congress but all three of them fought separately in the Lok Sabha elections, a scenario likely to persist in the assembly polls too. In the last assembly in J-K in 2014, the BJP had won 25 of its 87 seats and had joined hands with the PDP to form government under the leadership of the regional party's leader Mufti Mohammad Sayeed.
Its assembly now has 90 seats following delimitation.
