Manas Dasgupta
NEW DELHI, June 22: The centre’s first initiative to break the stalemate in Jammu and Kashmir and restore a popular government is expected to bear some fruits with the six-member the People’s Alliance for Gupkar Declaration (PAGD) finally agreeing to attend the meeting on Thursday convened by the prime minister Narendra Modi.
The PAGD after holding informal deliberations among themselves for the last three days held a meeting at the Srinagar residence of the National Conference chief Farooq Abdullah on Tuesday in which a decision was taken to respond positively to the prime minister’s invitation for talks to sort out the differences in the union territory.
After the meeting the PAGD leaders said they were in favour of a dialogue to resolve the J-K issue and would attend the meeting. “We favour a dialogue. There is no other way than a dialogue to resolve the current issues. The government should talk to everyone, including Pakistan, for a resolution,” the People’s Democratic Party (PDP) president Mehbooba Mufti said.
The BJP sources, however, said the central leaders did not appreciate Mufti’s reference to Pakistan for talks pointing out that J&K issue was entirely an internal matter of India where Pakistan did not figure in any way.
The PAGD leader Farooq Abdullah told reporters: “Mehbooba Ji, Mohammed Tarigami sahib and I will attend the all-party meeting called by the Prime Minister. We hope to keep our agenda before Prime Minister and Home Minister.”
Mehbooba Mufti, referring to Article 370, said the alliance came together to talk about “what has been taken from us.” “It is wrong, illegal and unconstitutional. Till you restore this, you cannot bring peace to the region,” she said post the meeting. The BJP, which was always ready to attend the meeting, welcomed the PAGD’s decision to take part in the PM’s meeting.
The Congress leader and a former chief minister Ghulam Nabi Azad, who is also among the invitees, said restoration of “full statehood” would be the “top of the agenda”.
However, Azad was non-committal on whether he would demand restoration of special status to J&K. The meeting is the first such exercise by the Union Government since the abrogation of Article 370 and splitting of J&K into two Union Territories in August 2019.
“Statehood will be the top demand, and it was promised on the floor of the House as well. Full-fledged statehood…not L-G’s statehood,” Azad said. About Article 370, the Congress leader said he was in talks with party leaders from both Jammu and Kashmir regions and it is too early to comment.
CPI(M) leader MY Tarigami said the Prime Minister has not informed them of the meeting’s agenda. “We will reiterate the agenda of the PAGD. We will appeal to the PM to reconsider the guarantees given to us under the Constitution,” he said.
The PAGD is a six-party alliance of mainstream parties which came into existence after the Centre revoked the special status of Jammu and Kashmir under Article 370.
In a first since the abrogation and the split of J&K into two Union Territories, the prime minister has scheduled an all-party meeting on Thursday inviting all mainstream political leaders. Both Farooq and his son Omar Abdullah, Mufti and Tarigami were among many leaders who were placed under house arrest since the abrogation of article 370 on August 5, 2019.
A top official of the Prime Minister’s Office (PMO), who is involved in the initiative, said there was only a single-point “agenda” for the meeting: the early handing over of power to elected representatives and an end to President’s rule.
Earlier, the National Conference and the People’s Conference had welcomed the move. National Conference, while calling it a “good change,” said there was realisation at the Centre that it cannot move forward in J&K without the mainstream political parties.
People’s Conference chairman Sajad Lone, who held discussions with his colleagues, said “This is a welcome development. Coming at the level of the Prime Minister, it speaks of the seriousness of this engagement. Given what has happened in the last two years, I am hoping that this could herald the start of a new phase of reconciliation.”
Welcoming the alliance’s decision, the J&K BJP president Ravinder Raina stated that “we all must unite in the interest of the nation and work for ‘Ek Bharat Shreshtha Bharat’”.
“It is very good that all political parties are taking part in the meeting. We have already announced that I along with my colleagues are joining the meeting,” he said. “It is a very important meeting and when the Prime Minister is on the chair it has its own sanctity. All issues of public interest will be discussed.”
On the Congress stand at the meeting, Azad said he was “consulting Congress leaders from both Jammu and Kashmir. After that, I will seek guidance from our party’s leadership — the Congress president and former prime minister Manmohan Singh and those colleagues who were directly or indirectly involved in this….So it is too early to say. Yes, I can say that full statehood will be top of the agenda,” Azad said. “We will formulate our stance… policy…after consultations and deliberations.”
Sources said the J&K Policy Planning Group of the Congress would meet soon to give final shape to the party’s stand for the meeting. Apart from Azad, the panel comprises Manmohan Singh, Karan Singh, P Chidambaram, AICC in-charge Rajni Patil, Tariq Hamid Karra and Ghulam Ahmed Mir.
Azad lauded the Government for taking such a step, “especially since the meeting is physical”. “We will get an opportunity to discuss freely,” he said. Apart from Azad, the other Congress leader believed to have been invited for the meeting is the party’s J&K chief Ghulam Ahmad Mir.
Azad, the former Leader of Opposition in Rajya Sabha, had been heavily critical of the Union Government for scrapping Article 370. His latest remarks, however, mirror the Congress’s official view — despite the differing opinions within — that stresses more on restoration of statehood and restart of the democratic process than Article 370.
On Sunday, the party reiterated its position with its communication department head Randeep Surjewala referring to the Congress Working Committee (CWC) resolution of August 6, 2019, demanding restoration of full statehood. While the resolution had attacked the BJP government on the manner in which Article 370 was abrogated and J&K downgraded and split into two Union Territories, it shied away from demanding restoration of Article 370.
Arguing that Article 370 is the Constitutional recognition of the terms of the Instrument of Accession between the state of Jammu and Kashmir, and India, the CWC had merely said it deserved to be honoured until it was amended after consultation with all sections in strict accordance with the Constitution.
On the stripping of J&K’s statehood, the resolution had said “Jammu & Kashmir acceded to India as one State and no government has the power to change its status or divide it or reduce any part of it to a Union Territory.”
Azad’s latest comments came on the day former Union minister and CWC member Chidambaram demanded restoration of status quo ante in J&K.
“Congress Party’s position, reiterated yesterday, that full Statehood must be restored to J&K should clear any doubt or ambiguity. What was made under the Constitution cannot be unmade by an Act of Parliament misinterpreting and misusing the provisions of the Constitution. Please remember that the dismembering of J&K has been challenged in the Supreme Court and the cases are pending for nearly 2 years. In the monsoon session, Parliament should repeal the offending laws and restore the status quo ante in J&K. That is the only way to draw the starting line for a political resolution of the Kashmir issue,” he tweeted.