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| What if J&K were USA and Omar were Obama | | | Early Times Reporter
Jammu | Apr 20
If Jammu and Kashmir were America and Omar Abdullah were barrack Obama, millions of people would have today hooked up to the internet surfing blogs and leaving comments.
But alas! No two way communication here. By his own admission, the National Conference president Omar Abdullah says that Jammu and Kashmir is nowhere close to the technology revolution which has taken on the country. Therefore, an element of frustration is but natural, as Omar Abdullah captions one of his posts on the blog.
For the readers in a state like Jammu and Kashmir where internet penetration is next to negligible, all this must be sounding surprising as what this newspaper is talking about. Well, to keep the people informed about its policies and programs, past, present and future, the National Conference has launched a website which can be accessed at www.jknc.org. Interestingly, the star attraction on the National Conference website is the blog of Omar Abdullah whose reputation of being an internet buff and facebook hooker is no secret.
As politics now comes to be practiced more through media than people, two main parties in Jammu and Kashmir –the National Conference and the Peoples Democratic Party –are aggressively competing against each other to occupy the printed columns. The launch of NC website and Omar’s blog puts it ahead in the race.
The conventional websites are usually one way communication where a huge stuff is posted on the net and surfer having no opportunity to get back with their agreement or disagreement to a discourse. However, the best part of National Conference website is that it has an interactive section where people can respond to what Omar feels in his posts.
In his first post on the blog, announcing his arrival on the blogspot, the National Conference president says “I am sure some, probably a lot, of what I have to say will provoke sharp reactions among the readers. I hope to provoke debate, discussion and through the comments that I receive, some amount of self improvement”.
Unfortunately enough, there are only few thousand people in Jammu and Kashmir who have access to internet and of them only few hundreds –actually few hundreds…it is not a note of pessimism –visit the internet connected computers on a daily basis. This can be gauged from the fact that since April 16, Omar has made four posts on his blog and only two them have got seven responses. Out of the seven two are from local journalists and five others mostly from the family members –probably one from mother Mollie.
If this blog of a politician were on America, it could have fetched not less than 700 responses on next few hours which Omar’s blog may not get during its entire span. Here, it is difficult not getting responses but also keeping the blog posted regularly. Therefore, Omar says in another post, “My first real post is to vent my frustration at the way Cell phone users are treated in J&K. I am a “Crackberry” addict, which is to say I am addicted to my Blackberry. I use it for my email, I use it to surf the net, I use it to keep up to date with all my Facebook friends and I even use it to check the weather from time to time but I can”t use it in J&K. I carry it and stare at it and will it to beep to let me know I have an incoming email but it silently sits in its holder mocking me for believing that Kashmir really is joining the telecom revolution”.
And when it about giving vent to the ire against the Chief Minister Ghulam Nabi Azad, Omar scribbles his blackberry to make a post on the blog whether there is a reader on other side or not. Therefore, when Azad threw open the Srinagar-Leh road a month ahead of the schedule amidst a fanfare, Omar reacts, “In his haste to open the Srinagar - Leh highway in April itself (with one eye on the elections most probably) Ghulam Nabi Azad has found that’’s it’’s not difficult to throw the road open but it’’s a whole different ball game keeping the road open. He travels to Sonamarg (by helicopter) and opens the highway linking Kashmir with Kargil and Leh. No sooner is the road thrown open that a vehicle carrying journalists to cover the event is almost swept off the road by an avalanche and one official’’s vehicle is swept off the road with the driver just escaping with his life. Today the road is closed again because of rain and snow. Azad’’s road opening didn”t even last 24 hours. Politicians should stick to politics and leave such things to the experts. Let the Border Roads, tasked with maintaining this crucial road link, decide when it’’s time rather than a Chief Minister whose only interest publicity regardless of safety and the cost in human lives”.
The last post on his blog is while he is watching the Twenty-Twenty match of ICL in which Omar elicits the innate feelings about the changing face of Cricket. So, Omar keep posted…if not many, it least there some who may be interested in knowing about the movies you watch and books you don’t read! |
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