'JKNPP accuses BJP of misusing official machinery ahead of local bodies polls'

The Jammu and Kashmir National Panthers Party Wednesday accused the BJP of using civil and police administration to promote its political interests in the state.

NPP chairman Harsh Dev Singh hurled the allegation while making an appeal to Governor Satya Pal Malik to ensure free and fair election for the urban local bodies in the "larger interest of peace" in the state.

Ensure transparent and clean elections the free and fair polls of local bodies would greatly help in retrieving the otherwise deteriorating law and order situation in the state, said Singh, also a former state minister.

He appealed to the Governor to evolve a proper mechanism to monitor the upcoming local body polls.

Fair and impartial elections can become the harbinger of peace in the state and set new political trends here," he said.

Observing that "J&K is in a different kind of situation", he said, "The militancy broke out in the state in 1989 after the complaints of rigging and subversion of democracy were taken non-seriously by the then rulers.

Claiming that the BJP would misuse the official machinery during the upcoming local body polls, he said, "Any attempt by the government agencies to promote a political party or to bully the politically inconvenient sections could prove catastrophic."