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Jammu: No discrimination under NC govt, says Farooq
National Conference presidents says the Gujjar community has seen a lot of hardships; he asks them to remain united and provide education to their children
National Conference president and former chief minister Farooq Abdullah on Tuesday said his party never discriminated in the name of region and religion. His comment came amid row over the MBBS admissions for first batch in Shri Mata Vaishno Devi medical college and allegations of discrimination against players from the Jammu region as none from Jammu found place in the team for Santosh Trophy.
Farooq was attending a programme organised here to commemorate the third death anniversary of Masud Ahmed Choudhary. “The NC has never discriminated with Jammu. Our party has always given equal treatment to Jammu but some forces are trying to divide us,” he said and referred to the NC government’s restoration of Darbar Move practice. “Darbar Move practice has been restored again, which is more beneficial to Jammu than Kashmir. We need to strengthen brotherhood and love between different communities rather than creating hatred,” he added.
He also noted that the Gujjar community has seen a lot of hardships and asked it to remain united and provide education to its children. He also underlined the need to improve facilities in Gujjar hostels.
His son and chief minister Omar Abdullah recalled the distinguished career of Masud Choudhary as an IPS officer and his role as the founding vice-chancellor of BGSB University in Rajouri. Omar, however, felt that the Gujjar-Bakerwal community was ‘a victim of the current political situation’.
“There have been a lot of natural calamities and the Gujjar community bore major brunt of it. We have to focus on research and see how we could tackle them in the future,” said Omar while referring to string of cloudbursts and heavy rainfall in August this year.
