SRINAGAR, March 24 - Decks were today cleared for PDP president Mehbooba Mufti to take over as the first woman chief minister of Jammu and Kashmir after she was unanimously elected as the legislature party leader and nominated as the party�s CM candidate.
56-year-old Mehbooba was elected as the leader of PDP Legislature Party at a meeting of the senior leaders, which included MPs, MLAs and MLCs, at her residence here.
PDP will now need a letter of support from BJP � seen as a mere formality � to become the first woman chief minister of the state.
�A meeting of all the senior leaders of PDP was held. During the meeting, the legislators of the party decided that Mehbooba Mufti should be the leader of the legislature party and should be nominated as a candidate for the post of chief minister of the state,� senior party leader Muzaffar Hussain Baig told reporters after the one-and-a-half-hour long meeting.
Baig said the �die has been cast� and formation of a democratically elected government is a mere formality.
�Now the only thing that is to be done is to meet the Governor. Mehbooba Mufti and the leader of BJP have to fix a date for swearing in (ceremony),� he said.
�It is only a formality. The die has been cast and we expect that in the very near future a political government will be in the seat,� he said.
Asked about the conditions laid by PDP for government formation, Baig said, �No, no... The Agenda of the Alliance is very comprehensive. There is no need to put any new issue.�
The Lok Sabha member from Baramulla said BJP general secretary Ram Madhav was right in saying that there were no new conditions for government formation. � PTI
