Omar cabinet clears resolution for statehood restoration, mum on 370

SRINAGAR: Chief minister Omar Abdullah ’s cabinet has cleared at its first meeting a resolution for restoration of J&K’s statehood but its silence on revival of special status has ignited allegations from rivals of a collusion with the Centre and BJP to “ratify” the 2019 abrogation of Article 370 and related provisions.

Omar’s five-member National Conference (NC) cabinet, including deputy CM Surinder Choudhary, approved the resolution late Thursday, a day after being sworn in. “The draft has been prepared and the CM will travel to New Delhi in a couple of days to hand it over to PM Narendra Modi, urging him to restore statehood,” a source said.

Omar’s ally and J&K Congress president Tariq Hameed Karra has already declared his party will not join the cabinet until statehood is back.

NC president and Omar’s father Farooq Abdullah expressed confidence the Centre would soon restore statehood. “We have talked about statehood before and even the Supreme Court has agreed to hear within two months an application seeking its restoration,” Farooq said Friday.

Not everyone was convinced, though. “Omar Abdullah’s first resolution on statehood is nothing less than ratification of the Aug 5, 2019, decision (abrogation of special status). There’s no resolution on Article 370. Scaling down demands to mere statehood is a huge setback, especially after seeking votes on the promise of restoring Article 370,” PDP youth president and Pulwama MLA Waheed Parra wrote in a post on X.

Baramulla MP Engineer Rashid accused Omar of playing into the hands of BJP --- a stunning reversal from the recent assembly polls when Omar had dubbed Rashid a BJP pawn who fielded candidates of his Awami Ittehad Party (AIP) to split votes. Now, Rashid alleged that NC won its 42 seats because it received “tactical” help from BJP.

“NC has promised a fight against Article 370 but Omar is deviating from the main issues by focusing on statehood restoration only,” Rashid said. The MP pointed out that since PM Modi and Union home minister Amit Shah have already pledged statehood, stressing on this point while ignoring other “grave issues” tantamounts to a “betrayal” by the new CM.

Rasheed claimed Omar had recently spoken about seeking restoration of special status when “BJP would not be in office at the Centre”. “I want to ask him whether Kashmiris should wait 100 years if BJP remains in power till then,” Rasheed said.

People’s Conference chief and Handwara MLA Sajjad Lone argued that the resolution should have been passed in the assembly rather than the cabinet.

“All across the country, to the best of my knowledge, the assembly is the proper institution for addressing major issues like that of statehood or Article 370. The will of the people of J&K is reflected in the assembly, not in the cabinet. The cabinet is a majoritarian institution. It does not reflect all shades and opinions as per the will of the people,” Lone argued. He added that revival of special status was a promise NC had made before the polls along with that of statehood.

Lone questioned what he described as “secrecy” behind the way Omar’s cabinet approved the resolution and the need for it to be handed over to PM Modi.