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Onkar Singh in Srinagar
The minute news started trickling in that the National Conference was trailing in many of the assembly segments, Ghulam Nabi Azad, president of the Jammu and Kashmir Pradesh Congress Committee and Muzzaffar Baig, senior leader of the Jammu and Kashmir People's Democratic Party, started moving together to show their solidarity.
Both leaders featured together on various television programmes. Azad had flown into Srinagar on Wednesday afternoon.
In fact, Azad and the PDP leaders had a late night meeting to work out a joint strategy in case the two parties did well in the assembly election.
"You did not believe me when I said the Congress would do well in Jammu region in particular. Now you have seen the results for yourself. The chief ministerial candidate of the ruling National Conference has been humiliated by the PDP candidate from Ganderbal," Azad told rediff.com before leaving for Jammu where Congressmen were expected to give him a rousing welcome.
Baig said his party is open to holding talks with the militants and roping them into the mainstream.
"We would be shouldering enormous responsibility. It is not going to be easy. The people have voted against the National Conference because the party was interested in continuing terrorism in the state. You should see the way even the policemen have celebrated the defeat of Omar Abdullah. We want to bring in militants and make them party to the solution of the problem of Jammu and Kashmir," he said.
Asked if Mufti would allow his daughter Mehbooba to become the chief minister of Jammu and Kashmir, Baig said, "If the party votes in favour of Mehbooba Mufti then he would listen to the party."
He complimented the Election Commission for holding free and fair elections in the state. "I would say that it was a fair election. I would not say that it was a free election because the militants were holding guns against those who wanted to take part in the electoral process," he said.
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