Valuable lessons for secular forces: CPI (M)

New Delhi, Oct 9: CPI (M) Polit Bureau today said that the contrasting results thrown up by Jammu and Kashmir and Haryana assembly elections, the resounding success in Jammu and Kashmir and the unexpected setback in the latter provide valuable lessons for secular forces in the struggle against BJP in the days to come.

In a statement the party said, “ In Jammu and Kashmir, the National Conference and its allies won a comfortable majority to form the first elected government after six years of Central government’s authoritarian rule. The unambiguous mandate of the people in Jammu and Kashmir is a rebuff to the machinations of the BJP Central government to scuttle the democratic aspirations of the people through abrogation of Article 370, abolition of statehood through bifurcation of the state into two Union Territories and the manipulative delimitation of the constituencies.”

CPI (M) added that in Haryana, the BJP managed to secure a majority of seats in a close fight with the Congress, but with a narrow margin of 0.6 per cent vote share over Congress. Its success is marked by micro-caste mobilization and insidious communal propaganda. The Congress will have to introspect as to the other factors responsible for this verdict, it said.

The CPI(M) congratulated the people of Kulgam constituency in Jammu and Kashmir for electing Mohammad Yousuf Tarigami for the fifth time.