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BJP may declare today its empower-Jammu formula
12/22/2010 11:49:49 PM
NEHA
ET REPORT
JAMMU, Dec 22: Almost all the national BJP leaders, including the party president, former Deputy Prime Minister and Leaders of the Opposition in the Lok Sabha and Rajya Sabha, would be in Jammu on Thursday and hold, according to some insiders, a "very important" meeting on the troubled-state. Some of them would address the "Maha Rally" to be held on Friday. It is perhaps for the first time that all the BJP bigwigs would be in Jammu, the City of Temples, also known as the city of persecuted refugees numbering about 1.5 million.
Since the top-ranking BJP leaders would be here to discuss issues relating to the troubled and militant and separatist-infested state and address the Maha Rally", it is expected that they may clear their stand on the miserable plight of the grossly ignored Jammu province. So far the BJP has groped in the dark and changed umpteen times its stand on Jammu. For example, in the early 90s, the BJP was a votary of regional development board, but it did practically nothing to achieve the stated goal. It just remained a hollow slogan.
In the beginning of the present century, the BJP at least twice adopted resolution on the state's reorganization on a regional basis and advocated the need to invest Jammu with legislative powers. Its reorganization formulation was highly flawed and vague in the sense that it talked of the Jammu's political empowerment sans any definite political instrument. It never explained as to how it would invest Jammu with legislative powers in the absence of an institution, called State. Only the institution of the State exercises legislative powers. Neither regional development board nor regional council enjoys the power to legislate. Even the autonomous hill development councils like the ones in Leh and Kargil do not exercise legislative powers and that's the reason the people in the Cold-Desert Ladakh continue to demand Union Territory status.
Significantly, the BJP is also a votary of Union Territory status for Ladakh. It's a contradiction in the sense that it doesn't mind the idea of Ladakh becoming a Union Territory and that opposes tooth and nail the idea of Jammu becoming a full-fledged state on the ground that the segregation of Jammu from Kashmir would mean handing over of Kashmir to Pakistan on a platter. The BJP has at no point in time ever explained the reasons behind their dual approach.
In 2002, the BJP abandoned its reorganization plank and agains reverted to its pre-2000 position. It sought Jammu's empowerment through a legislative council invested with administrative and financial powers. There was no reference to legislative powers. Arun Jaitley, presently Leader of the Opposition in the Rajya Sabha, was the architect of this toothless instrument. The BJP contested the 2002 assembly elections on this plank and miserably failed to mobilize the Jammu constituency in its favour. The Congress turned the tables and captured 15 seats, as against BJP's score of a paltry one. The BJP won the Nagrota seat by a slender margin of less than 70 votes. The Congress performed well because it contested the elections on four specific Jammu-centric planks - Chief Minister from Jammu, regional council, delimitation and end of discrimination with Jammu.
In 2008, the BJP abandoned its regional council plank as well and gave the slogan of "political empowerment of Jammu". It was again Jaitley who was the chief architect of this highly, highly vague formulation - formulation no BJP leader ever explained. In fact, it was impossible to explain this formulation. On the contrary, the Congress came out with a somewhat radical solution to the Jammu problem. It suggested an amendment in the State Constitution designed to federalize the state's polity and establish adequately empowered regional council for Jammu. The BJP won 11 seats and the Congress 13, despite the fact that the Congress went to the polls in an extremely hostile environment, the fall-out of the landmark Amarnath Land Agitation.
The BJP bigwigs would surely discuss all this as well as the future strategy calculated to strength the party in Jammu province. There are reasons to believe that the BJP may come out today with a clear-cut empower-Jammu doctrine. In fact, it has become imperative to keep its Jammu constituency intact, whatever its size. Anyway, if the BJP could support reorganization of Andhra Pradesh and demand a separate Telengana state, why can't it apply the same yardstick to Jammu and Kashmir, which is nothing, but like Pakistan, an unnatural formulation.
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