Opposition People’s Democratic Party (PDP) leader Mehbooba Mufti’s statement praising Gujarat chief minister Narendra Modi, which she is alleged to have made at the recently held National Integration Council (NIC) meeting in New Delhi, has pushed her in a tight situation on her home turf.
Though she has strongly denied she ever had eulogised Mr Modi, her political bête noire, chief minister Omar Abdullah on Tuesday seized the opportunity to scoff at her wondering if she can really disown something which others had heard her saying at the NIC meeting. The chief minister tweeted, “I’m not surprised Mehbooba praised Modi, she can praise whoever she likes; I’m surprised she’d deny it knowing others heard her speech.”
Leader of the Opposition in the Lok Sabha Sushma Swaraj had on Monday said that even Ms Mufti, whose PDP is deadly opposed to the BJP, had, while speaking at the NIC meeting, acknowledged Mr Modi’s leadership skills and that there is no discrimination against Muslims in Gujarat.
“Gujarat is a state where there is no discrimination against Muslims. No plan is made thinking whether Hindus will benefit or Muslims, even PDP president Mehbooba Mufti praised Modi’s style of governance during a meeting of the National Integration Council recently,” Ms Swaraj said on the sidelines of Mr Modi’s three-day fast. She added the PDP leader had admired Mr Modi for allowing a Muslim entrepreneur to set up factory and said that the chief minister not only gave time to the entrepreneur, but also cleared the proposal in half-an-hour.
As her reported statement courted a new controversy here and, in fact, has set off a war of words between archrivals in Kashmir politics, Ms Mehbooba not only denied having ever made it, she accused the BJP leader of being dishonest.
“Sushma Swaraj is lying. I never made such a statement praising the Gujarat chief minister ever. Swaraj’s claims that I praised Modi are totally baseless,” she said, adding that it was unfortunate that the BJP leader has chosen to misquote her for varied reasons.
“I never met her and never made such statement. I demand the government to make public the full text of my speech to clear the air over my reported praise of the Gujarat BJP leader,” she said.
But her refutation was not passable for the CM, who wrote on micro-blogging website Twitter: “Why cannot she just admit what she said, rather deny the whole thing. So much more graceful to accept rather than call Ms Swaraj a liar.”