The National Conference expelled eight workers on Wednesday for "wilfully" violating the party's decision to not participate in the upcoming panchayat and urban local body polls in Jammu and Kashmir.
"Eight workers of various wings were expelled in the Jammu region for anti-party activities," NC spokesperson Madan Mantoo said.
Those expelled include Ayub Malik, Ashwani Charak, Kuldeep Gai, Ashok Singh Manhas, S Sucha Singh, Subash Bhagat, Rekha Manhas and Manohar Lal Bhagat, Mantoo said. "They have wilfully violated the decision with regard to party's non-participation in the ongoing elections to civic bodies."
Meanwhile, NC provincial president Devender Singh Rana defended the party's decision to stay away from the polls, saying it was in the larger interest of the people as "overt and covert" attempts were being made to fiddle with Article 35A of the Constitution, which relates to the dignity and rights of the people of Jammu, Kashmir and Ladakh regions.
Taking a dig at the Congress for taking part in the elections, Rana accused the party of working against the interests of the people of the state. "History is replete with instances when it (Congress) trampled upon democracy and undermined the democratic institutions in the state."
"Congress, too, understands the imminent threat to this constitutional provision (Article 35A), but it has preferred to just pay lip service. Political opportunism has prevailed over the larger public interest," Rana told the media here.
Rana described the Congress and the Bharatiya Janata Party as two sides of the same coin, as far as "trampling democratic and constitutional rights" of the people of the state.
"BJP is a new entry in Jammu and Kashmir to subvert and fiddle with the special and distinct identity and status of the state, But, the Congress has mastered in anti-people machinations for the past seven decades," he alleged.
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