Will convert J&K into a 'real welfare state', says Mufti

If voted to power, Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) will carry forward its agenda of political resolution of Jammu and Kashmir and convert it into a real welfare state, party president Mehbooba Mufti said.
"With a decisive mandate, PDP will carry forward its agenda of political resolution, good governance and employment generation and convert Jammu and Kashmir into a real welfare state," Mufti said.
She was addressing a meeting of the party workers and office-bearers of North Kashmir here.
"The vision of (party patron and chief ministerial candidate) Mufti Mohammad Sayeed about the resolution of political problems of the state is already underway after the historic initiatives of 2003.

"(Former Prime Minister Atal Bihari) Vajpayee's bold initiatives were possible only when a chief minister of Sayeed's political sagacity, maturity and vision was at the helm in the state," she said.
Mehbooba, who represents south Kashmir's Anantnag constituency in Lok Sabha, said the party was able to inspire confidence among a majority of the people in all the regions of the state about its ability to solve problems faced the state.

She said the "political subversion and uncertainty" that the state has faced in the last seven decades has already taken a heavy toll on the state, its economy and human resources and it can ill afford any further disruption.

The PDP president said the credentials of the party, in the government and in opposition, are impressive and any comparison of this party with the ruling National Conference (NC) is not only out of place, but patently unfair.
"NC has been the dominant political force in the state for the last eight decades, half of which period it has been in power with huge electoral majority.
"Compared to that, Sayeed has spent most of his political life in opposition and struggling to establish an alternative in a unipolar political system where NC was the only dominant orbiter," she said.