Shah Faesal wants to be an amalgam of Kejriwal and Imran Khan

SRINAGAR: Shah Faesal, the 2010-batch first Kashmiri IAS topper who gave up his government job to join politics, has plans to float his own political party in the future, but as of now, he wants to create a political movement in Kashmir for cleaning the mess in politics and bureaucracy. He is inspired by the recent rise of Arvind Kejriwal and Imran Khan in the politics of the sub-continent.

Although he told The Sunday Guardian that he was against mushrooming of political parties in the state, he himself seems to be floating one. The 35-year-old said that he wanted to give clean politics and administration to the people of Jammu and Kashmir. Faesal has changed the script for his journey as of now. Earlier, he was all set to be the candidate of National Conference (NC) from Baramulla parliamentary segment in the forthcoming elections. After he visited different areas of North Kashmir and held talks with youth delegations, he got an overwhelming response not to join NC or People’s Democratic Party (PDP), to remain relevant. Faesal recently made his intentions clear when he appealed to the people for crowd-funding  his political activities. He told the media that he was getting a lot of response from the people and even some women had donated him their earrings. He said that he never expected such a huge response from the public on his appeal for donations. While talking to this reporter, Faesal said that he was deeply influenced and fascinated by the political journeys of Arvind Kejriwal and Imran Khan. He said that they made an outreach to the general public and were examples for anyone to follow with the dream of giving people some respite.

He, however, admitted that though many youths had promised him support in his endeavour, many youngsters were not convinced by his argument to go for mainstream politics.

“There is a lot of opposition to my idea of doing power politics as many youths are for aspirational politics in Kashmir,” Faesal said.

He is to yet to decide on how to chart out the future course for himself. He did not respond to the recent appeal of Governor Satya Pal Malik, when the latter suggested Faesal should continue as a bureaucrat and serve the people of Kashmir.

As Faesal has surprised many of his colleagues in IAS by his resignation, most of the political circles in Kashmir are giving a guarded response to his new role as a politician in Kashmir.