Senior politician, former Jammu and Kashmir deputy chief minister and co-founder of Peoples Democratic Party, Muzaffar Hussain Baig, is a man of many ambitions. The wily politician from north Kashmir is reported to have co-represented the JKLF founder Maqbool Bhat in his trial before execution. According to a two-year-old profile in a leading national daily, Baig is believed to be nurturing the ambitions of rising to the highest office of the state. Baig was roped into the party by late Mufti Mohammad Sayeed and he is believed to have played some role in drafting the constitution of the new political formation that had cemented its presence on J&K’s political battleground with a massive mandate from Kashmir Valley. But he could never come out of the shadow of Mufti’s aura, and his equation with Mufti’s daughter was equally disastrous. Buoyed by the growing bonhomie between India and Pakistan that paved way from the resumption of cross-LoC trade and people-to-people contact, the PDP went from strength to strength post-2002 assembly elections. However, the rise of PDP also gave birth to new power centres that began to emerge in all quarters. In the evolving scenario, insiders believe Baig started feeling ‘sidelined’. Some in the PDP hold that the underlying ‘grudge’ in Baig against the party leadership over the years for ‘ignoring’ him or, worse still, not even seeking his opinion on crucial policy issues (the alliance with BJP, for instance), has turned into poison. These days, Baig is camping in Jammu. Earlier this week, he held a meeting with former PDP leader Altaf Bukhari who seems to have obtained the clearance from New Delhi’s power corridors to further fracture the political landscape of J&K. If reports are to be believed, Baig is likely to join Bukhari’s upcoming political party. Indeed, his actions in the past few weeks and months indicate that he may be proving his detractors right who accused him of hatching machinations to divide the PDP. Regardless, the party is already in disarray. Baig can take solace from the fact that the party’s fortunes have gone from bad to worse following its coalition with the BJP. A vast majority of former lawmakers elected during 2014 assembly elections have left the party and joined their erstwhile enemies. With the party chief Mehbooba Mufti behind bars and a handful of PDP loyalists still latching onto the visibly sinking ship, the future seems dark and uncertain for the ‘Qalm Dawaat’ party. In the prevailing political chaos, Baig seems to have smelled the right opportunity!