Excelsior Correspondent
SRINAGAR, May 14: Terming extension of NFSA and NEET to the State as attempts to erode internal autonomy of Jammu and Kashmir, the former Chief Minister and National Conference president Dr Farooq Abdullah today alleged that New Delhi was reinventing its mission of rendering Article 370 irrelevant through political connivance with PDP.
“What others did between 1953 and 1975, PDP is following suit and re-enacting the same master-servant opportunistic relationship that has wreaked havoc with out State,” he said while addressing a day-long lawyers’ conclave, organized by the NC Legal Cell, at party headquarters, here today.
Recollecting how New Delhi impulsively rejected the Autonomy resolution that the NC passed in the Legislative Assembly without even bothering to review and analyze its constitutional validity and feasibility, Farooq Abdullah claimed that it was at this juncture in history that New Delhi felt the need to prop up another regional party in the State to sabotage the demand for the restoration of Internal Autonomy. “Today that regional party is dutifully helping New Delhi in the extension of Central laws and examinations to the State without a word of opposition or disagreement. They are repaying New Delhi’s political investment in them since the past two decades and we cannot afford to not remain vigilant about these internal foes and Trojan Horses”, he said.
Farooq alleged that there were clear indications that a long-existing lobby in New Delhi was reinventing its mission to erode what remains of the State’s internal autonomy. “I have personally witnessed how this lobby in New Delhi has used pliant leaders and regimes in the State to erode Article 370 and rob the State of its constitutionally guaranteed Internal Autonomy – one step at a time. This is a chronicle of betrayals and breach of faith that started with the deposition and incarceration of Sher-e-Kashmir Sheikh Mohammad Abdullah and continues to this day,” he said.
“Today we see the efforts of this lobby manifest in the form of the extension of NFSA and NEET to the State while the PDP-BJP Government is peddling an ‘Industrial Policy’ which is glaringly conspicuous in its ambiguity on the question of non-State-subject investors and promoters,” the NC leader added.
Asking Chief Minister Mehbooba Mufti to draw lessons from history, Farooq Abdullah said that those local pliant politicians who had connived against the State and its people had witnessed rejection, resentment and humiliation instead of a political legacy long after they had left this world.
The National Conference president said Sher-e-Kashmir Sheikh Mohammad Abdullah rendered great sacrifices to fight for the rights and honour of his people and those who are trying to portray historical facts out of context by speaking about him today don’t have the slightest of idea about our history. “My father never compromised with the State’s honour and dignity. The fact that he spent more than two decades of his youth in prison cells attests to this fact. He never allowed the dilution or erosion of the State’s sub-national political identity and New Delhi did this through pliant, puppet leaders,” he said and added that the same people who have the audacity to claim that no damage can be done to Article 370 ironically come from the same rootstock that helped in its erosion till now. “They are the political heirs of a long legacy of connivance and treachery with this State and they should beware of the reprisals of treachery”, Dr Abdullah said.
Asking the legal fraternity to leave no stone unturned to defend Article 370 and the State’s special status, Farooq Abdullah said our lawyers should continue to fight for the legal rights of our people with courage and determination. “You have the legal acumen and the knowledge to foil these attempts to undermine the State’s autonomy and rob what remains of Article 370. We saw how the judiciary stood up to the Central Government in Uttarakhand and upheld the sanctity of democracy and the Constitution and this is something that should inspire all of us,” he said and announced that National Conference would strengthen its legal cell and be in constant coordination with the legal fraternity in the common mission of safeguarding the State’s political rights and status.
On this occasion the National Conference Legal Cell passed a resolution pledging to safeguard the State’s Special Status as provided in Article 370 of the Indian Constitution at all costs and to foil all efforts being engineered to erode the autonomy available to the State. The NC Legal Cell also resolved to leave no stone unturned to restore the State’s Internal Autonomy as it existed prior to 1953 and also supported the resolution passed for the restoration of Autonomy in the Legislative Assembly in the year 2000. The NC Legal Cell resolved to protect the rights of the people of the State guaranteed under the State’s constitution and laws.
The one-day lawyers’ conclave was also attended by NC general secretary Haji Ali Mohammad Sagar, NC additional general secretary Dr Sheikh Mustafa Kamal, vice president Choudhary Mohammad Ramzan, NC provincial president Nasir Aslam Wani, NC spokesperson Junaid Azim Mattu and NC provincial secretary Advocate Showkat Ahmed Mir.
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