Thaindian News

Jammu, Oct 17 (IANS) Caught on the back-foot following the controversy over alleged corruption in its organisation and death of party worker Sayeed Muhammad Yousuf in custody, Jammu and Kashmir’s National Conference has begun a campaign to “reactivate cadres”.

There is an “urgent need to activate and reactivate our grassroots workers as they are backbone of the organisation,” party additional general secretary Sheikh Mustafa Kamal told the party leaders and workers here Monday.

Kamal, the de facto second-ranking leader after president Farooq Abdullah as general secretary Sheikh Nazir is bed-ridden for the past several months, is Abdullah’s younger brother. He was appointed to the newly-created party post early this month.

He said the panchayat elections held earlier this year were demonstration of the people across the state, as they “withstood the fear and pressure of separatists who had given a poll boycott call”.

“We have to summon a similar spirit among ourselves and our party cadres,” said Kamal, adding: “There is no other option but to activate the party cadres. We must have people elected to the organisational posts and not through nominations.”

The National Conference had felt the absence of the organisational activity when it was in the news for the wrong reasons early this month after revelations by two party leaders in the Valley that they had bribed Yousuf, who promised them a minister’s post and a berth in the legislative council.

The Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) had seized the issue and mounted a string of protests, calling upon the Omar Abdullah government to resign.