Thank you for talking about NC manifesto, Omar Abdullah takes a dig at Amit Shah

National Conference vice-president Omar Abdullah took a jibe at Union home minister Amit Shah, saying that they were thankful to him for reading their manifesto and in turn forcing many others to go through it.

The former CM, however, was quick to add that it was “unfortunate” that Shah mentioned things that were not in the manifesto, urging the home minister to reread it.

“I am thankful from the bottom of my heart that the home minister mentioned our manifesto… When he notices it, it forces others, who were not ready to read it otherwise, to go through it,” he said, adding,“But unfortunately the home minister could only see only one paragraph in the manifesto and he also said those things which were nowhere in the manifesto like name changing.”

The statement comes in the backdrop of Shah targeting the Congress-NC combine in the lead-up to the Jammu and Kashmir assembly elections.

Posing 10 questions, Shah had said on ‘X’: “Does the Congress support the National Conference’s promise of a separate flag for Jammu and Kashmir? Do Rahul Gandhi and the Congress party support the JKNC’s decision to restore Article 370 and 35A, and thereby push Jammu & Kashmir back into an era of unrest and terrorism? Does the Congress support promoting separatism again by engaging in dialogue with Pakistan instead of Kashmir’s youth?”

NC and Congress ally, CPIM, responded with a fresh set of questions, with leader MY Tarigami saying: “Since 2014, the reins of Jammu and Kashmir have been with the Delhi government, directly since 2018. The people want to know why you are shying away from mentioning your achievements here. What happened to inflation? How much employment have you provided here? How much business was promoted?”

On Thursday, NC president Farooq Abdullah said his party has finalised an alliance with the Congress for all 90 assembly seats in J&K. The CPIM is also part of the alliance.