The rumblings between National Conference MP from Srinagar Agha Syed Ruhullah and Jammu & Kashmir Chief Minister Omar Abdullah, which had been going on for quite some time, have finally reached the party patriarch, Farooq Abdullah. He has asked Ruhullah to seek a mandate for himself.

This means that if Ruhullah wants to survive independently, he would have to resign from the party and seek re-election. 

Ruhullah has issued a public statement saying that he is willing to resign on November 3, the anniversary of his father’s martyrdom. His father was killed in a landmine blast in 2000.

This development could be a pre-Diwali gift for the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party at the Centre. The BJP had made no secret of its desire to have a Hindu chief minister in J&K, though it could not achieve that objective. 

Kashmir remains the only Muslim-majority region in India that was once a state and is now a Union Territory, apart from Lakshadweep.

The doom and gloom for Kashmir began taking form the day the Peoples Democratic Party, despite an unconditional offer from the National Conference to form the government, decided to go ahead with the BJP in 2015.

The BJP abruptly withdrew its support in June 2018. The NC and Congress then decided to support the PDP to help keep the BJP at bay.

By August 2018, however, the new J&K Governor, Satya Pal Malik, had decided to look the other way as the political machinations unfolded. During his tenure, the groundwork was laid for the eventual abrogation of Articles 370 and 35-A, which had provided Jammu & Kashmir with its special constitutional status.

Malik artfully camouflaged his socialist background. He called PDP chief minister Mehbooba Mufti “his beti”, or daughter, in an apparent effort to smooth the path for what was to come.

The political melee reached another stage in November 2018. The PDP did not gherao Raj Bhawan, now called Lok Bhawan. Instead, it appeared to rely on a letter of support from the NC and Congress being sent to the famously broken fax machine at Raj Bhawan.

Satya Pal Malik then dissolved the Assembly, particularly on Eid Milad-un-Nabi. He later fell out with Prime Minister Narendra Modi and, met an ignominious end,........

© Kashmir Observer