Bharatiya Janata Party MLA Choudhary Lal Singh on Saturday said that governor’s administration should initiate the process of delimitation of assembly constituencies before holding elections in Jammu and Kashmir.
Alleging that present seat distribution was “unconstitutional and discriminatory against Jammu and Ladakh regions,” Lal Singh said, “There is no fun of holding elections in this scenario, which only favours a single region, ignoring two important parts of the state,” Lal Singh, who founded Dogra Swabhimaan Sangathan earlier this year, said while addressing a press conference today at his residence.
Singh, who was a minister in PDP-BJP government, lost his ministry along with another minister Chander Prakash Ganga in much publicised Kathua Rape Case wherein the ministers supported the rape accused.
“Without any constitutional provision, Kashmir region which has relatively less area secures 46 assembly seats while Jammu has only 37 and Ladakh region only four. However, area wise Jammu and Ladakh deserves more assembly segments,” Singh said.
“Moreover, Jammu needs six seats for Pakistani refugees living in Jammu, two for Pandit migrants and one for Kashmir Muslim migrants,” he said.
Taking dig at regional parties for “dividing” Ladakh and areas of Jammu, he said, “Ladakh was most peaceful area but some Kashmir-centric parties sowed seeds of divide in Kargil on religious basis. In Jammu, they illegally created Pir-Panchal region and Chenab Valley region on religious lines but failed to develop same at par with areas of Kashmir.”
Singh maintained that rotational chief minister with two deputy chief ministers is the only way out to end “discrimination.”
Commenting on attempts of government formation by People Democratic Party (PDP)-National Conference (NC)- Congress and also by People Conference–BJP, Singh said, “It was a high voltage drama in which Governor got trapped.”
“It was a high voltage drama created by the PDP, NC, Congress and Sajjad Lone headed People Conference,” he said adding that all these political parties joined hand because they felt that their MLAs were in mood of quitting the parties to join new platform.”
“All these parties were demanding dissolution of the Assembly because they were afraid of losing power in case if any other party formed the government,” he added.
Terming PDP’s letter addressed to the Governor as ‘mockery’, he said, “These parties were never serious of forming the government.” “Governments do not run on telephones or on fax machines but interested parties meet the Governor and stake the claim and what PDP did was reverse of it,” he said.