Srinagar: Kashmiri separatist leader Syed Salim Gilani on Sunday joined the People's Democratic Party led by Mehbooba Mufti.
The PDP has offered him a ticket to contest from Srinagar's Khanyar seat in the upcoming J&K Assembly elections, party sources said.
Mr Gilani's Jammu and Kashmir People's Party was a member of the separatist amalgamation Hurriyat Conference.
Recently, in an interview with this newspaper, he said, “By declaring elections as forbidden fruit, perhaps we made a historic mistake. Politics is a game of possibilities. We never paid attention to the possibilities and in the meantime, a lot of water has flowed down the Jhelum.” He was referring to the separatists who boycotted the elections held in J&K after the outbreak of militancy in 1989.
On Sunday, Gilani, after joining the PDP in the presence of party president and former Chief Minister Ms Mufti, said that its ideology is close to his heart as it speaks on the Kashmir issue and people rotting in jails. He said, “I could not see a better platform for myself than the PDP. I was always inspired by the vision of the late Mufti Muhammad Sayeed, the patron of the party. He always spoke about the solution of the Kashmir issue. The party also seeks the release of hundreds of people rotting in jails.”
Asked about his association with the Hurriyat Conference, he said, “I felt proud to be there and I feel proud to be with the PDP now. I will carry forward the vision of the PDP because I fit into this ideology.”
Welcoming Gilani to the party, Ms Mufti said she wanted him to contest the Assembly elections but he refused. “He told us to give the chance to someone else,” she said.
Several former officials and members of the banned Jamaat-e-Islami, Jammu and Kashmir (JeI) are also contesting the Assembly elections as independents, a move that some Kashmir observers are calling a change of heart. However, others say the changing political landscape in Jammu and Kashmir has forced the JeI men to join the fray.
The last time the JeI contested elections was in 1987, when it joined the Muslim United Front, an amalgamation of several separatist parties and related political groups. After 1989-90, the JeI was part of the Hurriyat Conference, which advocated boycotting elections between 1993 and 2003.
However, in August, the JeI had announced that it would field its former members as independent candidates in select seats in the upcoming Assembly elections. The decision was welcomed by regional political parties in Jammu and Kashmir, including the National Conference and the People’s Democratic Party, who termed it as a victory for democracy. However, these parties had also reiterated their demand for lifting the ban on the JeI which, as claimed by PDP president Ms Mufti, has “contributed a lot in the education sector, helped people in the 2014 floods and Covid.”
Meanwhile, journalist-turned-politician Suhail Bukhari, who quit the PDP last month after being denied a party ticket to contest from Kreeri-Wagora local ward in Baramulla district, joined the Congress party on Sunday. Former minister and Jammu NC leader Babu Jagjeevan Lal also joined the Congress. Both were welcomed into the party by JKPCC chief Tariq Hameed Karra at a function held here.