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| Now, PDP fields Khan to shed crocodile tears on State Subject laws | | The art of political doublespeak | | Early Times Report
SRINAGAR, Dec 2: After maintaining a meaningful silence on the State Subject laws during its three-year rule in coalition with the BJP, the People's Democratic Party (PDP) is now, what many believe, shedding crocodile tears on the critical issue.
Reacting to reports about Governor administration's alleged fiddling with the State Subject laws, the PDP says the Governor is acting beyond his mandate. The party has fielded its general secretary and former minister Abdul Haq Khan to peddle its apparent doublespeak on the issue.
Cautioning the Governor against the attempts to reinvent everything in Jammu and Kashmir, Khan said in a statement on Saturday that Governor rule is a transitory arrangement and he (Satya Pal Malik) should avoid disrupting the existing laws and procedures in the state. Khan added that the State Subject is a sensitive issue and there have been complaints in the past also that some non-state subjects have acquired the certificates in spite of the foolproof arrangements.
The PDP leader said that the system of granting the Permanent Resident Certificate (PRC) is an established practice and should not be diluted at any cost. "This is a matter of the identity of the state and any attempt to relax it will meet with resistance. It can open a Pandora box if the procedure is relaxed in any way. The system in vogue is the outcome of generation's wisdom and departmental procedures. Same cannot be undone or fiddled with at whims of somebody," Khan said, adding that "it is surprising that some people in the administration are out to damage the credibility of Governor's administration."
What is surprising however is that six months ago it was the same PDP whose leader Mehbooba Mufti was heading the coalition government with the support of the BJP, and while at the helm of affairs neither she nor any of her party leaders spoke on the issue of PRC.
While the PDP is now warning New Delhi of serious repercussions if the State Subject laws are fiddled with, its silence on the serious issue while in power is intriguing and meaningful.
Notably, hundreds of non-state subject businessmen from the neighbouring states of J&K like Punjab and Himachal have fraudulently obtained PRCs and have permanently settled in Jammu. They have opened their business outlets in many parts of Jammu region, particularly in the Jammu city, at the cost of local business houses.
"These non-state subject businessmen are known to fund some political parties of J&K to keep them silent on the issue of state subject. The beneficiaries of these non-local business houses include the PDP which is now shedding crocodile tears on the issue," a top official in the administration had told Early Times some months ago. He said Mehbooba and her part do not appear to annoy the strong non-local business lobby settled in Jammu after fraudulently obtaining state subjects.
On August 4, National Conference Provincial President Devender Singh Rana had demanded a drive against fake state subject holders. "State Subject Laws, the essence of Article 35A, were enacted by Maharaja Hari Singh Ji in 1927, essentially to preserve special identity and economy of Jammu region from the onslaught of the non-state subject traders thronging from the neighboring states", Rana had said.
He said that the revolutionary Permanent Resident Laws of the Maharaja Bahadur guaranteed the state's special identity besides political and economic empowerment of the people of Jammu, Kashmir and Ladakh.
While Rana had made his party's position abundantly clear on the burning issue which concerns every citizen of J&K, people of the state were looking towards PDP president and former Chief Minister Mehbooba Mufti when she was in power.
Mehbooba, however, maintained a meaningful silence on the issue. And now she and her party colleagues are trying to make a political capital out of it, and in the process exposing their doublespeak. |
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