SRINAGAR: Come election time, the political parties resort to different tactics to woo voters. Ahead of the Lok Sabha polls, the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) seems to have pulled out a rabbit out of its hat to curry favour with the voting public. It has picked green over its trademark saffron in the Muslim-majority Kashmir.
In a campaign blitz for its Srinagar candidate Khalid Jehangir, the BJP has published bulk advertisements where the predominant colour used is green as opposed to saffron. Green signifies the colour of Islam.
In the Valley, green is also taken to represent “separatist sentiment”.
Khalid, a former journalist, is up against a political heavyweight in National Conference (NC) president and sitting MP Farooq Abdullah, Aga Mohsin of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) and Irfan Ansari of the Peoples Conference (PC).
The BJP published the ‘green’ advertisements in many local dailies on Tuesday and also put up similar hoardings in Jehangir’s support, setting the social media abuzz with comments galore on the saffron party going green in the Valley.
“In Kashmir, the colours are changing and how! Such are the political colours of elections. How saffron has been greened! Or is it the PDP has left an indelible mark on the BJP palette (sic),” tweeted former PDP leader and finance minister Haseeb Drabu.
“Very interesting. Saffron presented as green in Kashmir. Who is deceiving whom,” tweeted another netizen.
Another said, “Have you heard about ‘while in Rome, do as Romans do.’”
A third said, “Look the hypocrisy of BJP. They are adopting green colour in Kashmir for attracting votes.”
However, defending the use of green, state BJP chief spokesman Sunil Sethi said, “Even the Tricolour has green.”
Seeking to curry favour with voters
In a campaign blitz for its Srinagar candidate Khalid Jehangir, the BJP has published bulk advertisements where the predominant colour used is green as opposed to saffron. Green signifies the colour of Islam and is also believed to represent “separatist sentiment”.