SRINAGAR, 13 July 2003 — Kashmir’s former ruling party, the National Conference, yesterday deserted India’s ruling coalition led by Hindu extremists in its bid to contain the fallout of last year’s provincial elections.

The National Conference is looking for ways to appeal to Kashmiris after being closely associated with Prime Minister Atal Behari Vajpayee’s government.

Meanwhile, the region’s main freedom movement, the All Parties Hurriyat Conference, changed its leaders hoping to heal deep divisions among moderate and hard-line factions within the umbrella group comprising more than two dozen parties opposed to Indian rule in Kashmir.

Moulvi Abbas Ansari, the 65-year-old head of the Ithadul Muslimeen, becomes the first Shiite to head the Hurriyat.

The appointment was announced by outgoing Hurriyat chairman Abdul Gani Bhat, who has served since June 2000 and whose term expired.

National Conference leader Omar Abdullah, a 33-year-old from a long line of Kashmir leaders, said yesterday the party was leaving Vajpayee’s coalition as a way to “reorient” itself.

“Over the past few years we tended to become Delhi’s boys in Kashmir rather than Kashmir’s boys in Delhi. This is something we will try to correct,” he said.

Abdullah criticized the federal government over riots last year in Gujarat, the largest state ruled by Vajpayee’s Hindu nationalist BJP party.

“I am personally regretful I did not put in my resignation when the Gujarat riots took place,” Abdullah said.

But he also acknowledged the National Conference felt slighted since losing power. Vajpayee was hosted by Kashmir Chief Minister Mufti Muhammad Sayeed when he made a rare visit to Kashmir on April 18.

“Whether you believe it or not Mufti Sayeed is perhaps the more important member of the NDA than the NC,” Abdullah said. “He shares a stage with the PM, where we are not even invited to.”

Abdullah was until last year a prominent spokesman for Vajpayee, serving as junior foreign minister through much of the crisis with Pakistan.

Six Killed, 13 Hurt in Unrest: Five Hindu students and three Kashmiris were injured yesterday in a bomb explosion in Kashmir, while six people were killed in other violence, police said.

Five Hindu girls from outside Kashmir were injured when a bomb went off in the rear seat of a bus carrying students in Bandipora township, 60 km south of Srinagar, police said. The blast also injured three Kashmiri Muslim pedestrians, including a three-year-old, police said.

Meanwhile, a Muslim who worked with the Indian army was abducted from his house near Kokernag in the southern Anantnag district late Friday and shot dead yesterday morning, police said.

Police said suspected rebels shot dead another man, Mohammed Rafiq, in the southern Doda district. The motivation for the killing was not immediately clear.

Separately, a policeman was killed in a gun battle with rebels overnight in the southern Poonch district. Three more militants were killed in Kupwara and Rajouri.