Azad criticises parties for trying to polarise votes on

Senior Congress leader Ghulam Nabi Azad today denounced parties trying to polarise votes on religious grounds instead of focusing on development.
"Some political parties are propagating that Chief Minister should be Hindu and some Kashmir valley-based political parties are trying to woo the people that Chief Minister should be from Kashmir," he said.
His comments, while addressing a series of rallies in Banihal constituency, came in the wake of statements by some political leaders about religious affiliations of the next Jammu and Kashmir chief minister.
"But, I as Indian am not bothered about any Muslim, Hindu, Sikh, Christian or of any other caste as Chief Minister. We are not bothered about the religious identity of Chief Minister. What state need is a secular leader whose heart beats for the poor and downtrodden people irrespective of their castes and religion", he added.

It is sad that political parties are trivialising the entire religious issue in the name of Prime Ministers in general and Chief Ministers in particular, Azad said.
While appealing the people to vote in favour of Congress candidates, he said, "We need a chief minister with a developmental orientation having a capacity of building roads, schools, hospitals, colleges, universities, government buildings, new avenues of employment for educated unemployed youths of Jammu and Kashmir".
"The one who can maintain law and order. And above all, he or she should have the capacity and capability to deal with post flood situation, which had caused devastation and washed off lakhs of houses and agriculture land besides, school, and hospital buildings and also bridges and roads across the state," he added.