Mehbooba likely to make brother Tassaduq her adviser
Jammu and Kashmir chief minister is likely to appoint her brother and party's candidate from Anantnag, Tassaduq Mufti, as an adviser.
While there is no official confirmation, the buzz was created by National Conference (NC) working president Omar Abdullah in the morning, after a tweet on social media.
The news was confirmed to Hindustan Times by a senior official who did not want to be quoted.“It is in the pipeline,” the official said.
Abdullah hinted at the possibility of a “new adviser” for the CM, but stopped short of giving any name. “The buzz in the secretariat is that @MehboobaMufti is appointing a new advisor in the next 24-36 hours (sic),” Abdullah had tweeted.
This elevation will give Tassaduq a position equivalent to a cabinet minister in the current administration. Academician professor Amitabh Mattoo held the position before Tassaduq.
Later in the day, however, NC issued a statement calling the decision “laughable”. “It proved beyond any doubt the existence of two parallel power centres in the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) and consequently the state government,” the statement read.
In the statement, NC state spokesperson Junaid Mattu said that Tassaduq's appointment was “a back-door anointment of a runaway candidate from the Anantnag by-poll, who is being foisted on the people of state by the Mufti family”. NC’s statement claimed that Mufti has been running a “parallel office and his appointment has made it official”.
“Tassaduq’s appointment is more of an anointment from the back-door when his party failed to contest an election in Anantnag ,” the statement read.