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| Congress not allowing NC to impose its will | | Sagheer Report | | Neha
Jammu, Dec 28: The cabinet sub-committee (CSC) examining the Justice Sagheer Ahmed report on Centre-State Relations (Working Group No. 5) yesterday again decided to seek another extension of three months from the Jammu and Kashmir Government. Why? Why because of lack of quorum, as also because its extended term will end on December 30. This would be the fifth extension. The CSC has been seeking extension after extension because it is vertically divided into two groups. One group is supporting greater autonomy and the other reportedly opposing it. The NC members are for the acceptance of the Sagheer Ahmed Report. As for the Congress members, they have a different viewpoint. That's the reason the NC and the Congress have failed to reach a consensus on the recommendations as contained in the Sagheer Ahmad Report. It has held 15 sittings so far.
It needs to be noted that the CSC was appointed last year by the State Government. It was charged with the responsibility of examining the report and suggesting what could be implemented and what could not be. The CSC consists of eight members, including its chairman. Four members belong to the NC and four to the Congress. The CSC is headed by senior NC leader and Finance Minister Abdul Rahim Rather. Four members belonging to the NC are Law and Parliamentary Affairs Minister Ali Mohammad Sagar, Industries and Commerce Minister Surjit Singh Slathia and Transport Minister Qamar Ali Akhoon, besides Abdul Rahim Rather. The Congress members are Revenue Minister Raman Bhalla, Tourism Minister Rigzin Jora, Irrigation and Flood Control Minister Taj Mhi-ud-Din and Health Minister Sham Lal Sharma.
It is also important to note that the Prime Minister's Fifth Group on Centre-State Relations, which was constituted in 2006, has dealt with the autonomy demand as advocated by the NC, as also with Article 370 that confers a special status on the state on the ground that it is Muslim-majority. It has also reflected on the self-rule demand as advocated by the PDP. It has also taken into consideration the suggestion as made by the former Speaker of the Assembly Tara Chand (presently Deputy Chief Minister). His suggestion was that the 1975 accord between the then Prime Minister Indira Gandhi and president of Plebiscite Front Sheikh Abdullah, grandfather of Chief Minister Omar Abdullah, could help resolve the Kashmir issue and forge a lasting peace in the state. He had made this suggestion overlooking the fact that the said accord had been implemented in full in 1975 itself, when the then Congress abdicated power in favour of Sheikh Abdullah. Tara Chand was perhaps not aware of the implications of what he suggested.
The fact of the matter is that Justice Sagheer Ahmad report contains recommendations, vague or otherwise, which, if accepted and given effect to, would unsettle things in the state and provoke political explosions of portentous dimensions, particularly in Jammu province and Ladakh. The report is essentially Kashmir-centric. The people of Jammu and Ladakh, as everyone knows, want the state's full merger with India and application of the Indian Constitution to the State in full, barring the communal, separatist, anti-people and anti-democratic Article 370. For, they believe, and very rightly, that Article 370 is the root cause of all troubles in the state as well as for their total neglect and marginalization.
It is this attitude of the people of Jammu and Ladakh that has led to the deadlock in the CSC. Raman Bhalla, Sham Lal Sharma and Rigzin Jora are fully aware of the views of the people of these two regions. They know it full well that their support to the Sagheer Ahmed Report would create difficult situation for them in their respective regions, and, hence, their unwillingness to endorse the NC line. Taj Mhi-ud-Din, though a staunch supporter of Omar Abdullah, also cannot endorse the NC line because he is a Gujjar. The Gujjars and Bakerwals, all Sunni Muslims, have got the Scheduled Tribe status and now they are clamouring for political reservation. They are not for the implementation of the report because they know its implementation would deprive them of the concessions they have been enjoying since April 1991, when the then Chandra Shekhar-led Central Government conferred the ST status on them, besides other tribal communities like Gaddis.
That the Congress members of the CSC have not allowed the NC to carry the day till date is something that must be appreciated by all those in the state who vouch for a dispensation that is secular, democratic, pro-India and people-centric and that empowers Jammu and Ladakh to administer their own political, administrative, social and economic affairs themselves in a meaningful manner. One can hope that the Congress members of the CSC would continue to hold their own against the NC members. In fact, they have no other alternative but to oppose tooth and nail all the NC moves calculated to de-link the state from the political and constitutional organization of India and deprive Jammu and Ladakh of their legitimate due share in the state's political and economic processes. |
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