news details |
|
|
| Has NC taken Cong on board? What has Kamaal to say? | | Revocation Of AFSPA | |
NEHA
JAMMU, Apr 15: On April 10, NC additional general secretary and younger brother of NC president Farooq Abdullah and uncle of Chief Minister Omar Abdullah denounced JKPCC president Saif-ud-Din Soz and asked him not to go public on issues confronting the NC-Congress coalition government in the state. "Such utterances may earn (the) Congress some public sympathy, but it is not going to help the state government or the coalition by any means…The Congress leadership should instead use the proper forum to project such issues. Prof Soz is chairman of the Coalition Coordination Committee (CCC), he should raise these issues on this platform or in the Congress Working Committee…Even I don't know much about 73rd and 74th constitutional amendments, how come masses know of it. What is the purpose of such uttering in public?," he has reportedly said while reacting to the JKPCC chief's statement that the Congress wanted the state government to adopt 73rd and 74th constitutional amendments to empower the local bodies, including panchayats, but the NC was not doing anything in this regard.
Yesterday, sources close to Omar Abdullah gave the people to understand that the Chief Minister "is determined to raise the issue of repeal of AFSPA from some areas in the state at the Chief Ministers' meet in New Delhi on Monday". "AFSPA is not for maintaining law and order, it's to fight militancy...and in those areas where militants have packed their bags and gone home, the special powers must go. The Chief Minister was expected to tell the Central government that this was an idea whose time had come -- as the separatists are talking of participating in elections and the army has strengthened its counter-infiltration grid, and the man on the street wants to be left alone without the fear of the men in olive green looking over everywhere all the time," the Chief Minister would argue during the Chief Ministers' meeting, according to the these sources.
Omar Abdullah has been raking up this issue again and again since months, especially since October 2011. He also reportedly raised this issue during his meeting with Union Home Minister P Chidambaram in Jammu just five days ago. But this is not the issue. The issue is different. The issue is the Mustafa Kamaal's different yardsticks. He has one yardstick for his own party and another for the Congress party. He wants the local Congress leaders, including the JKPCC chief, to keep their mouth shut and not say anything about any issue facing the state government. On the contrary, he wants the NC to exercise absolute powers, including the power to attack and ridicule the Congress and denounce New Delhi and take decisions unilaterally and make them public. Both Omar Abdullah and Kamaal have been conducting themselves in the manner in which those running single-party governments conduct themselves.
The questions to be asked to the Chief Minister and additional general secretary of the NC are: Have they discussed the AFSPA issue in the Congress-NC Coordination Committee? Or, have they taken the JKPCC into confidence before taking up this sensitive issue with the powers-that-be in New Delhi during the Chief Ministers' meet? Or, has the Cabinet authorized the Chief Minister to raise this issue during the Chief Ministers' meet? The answer to any of these three questions cannot be yes.
Another question to be asked is: Have they taken those Congress leaders into confidence who opposed the demand seeking revocation of the AFSPA just five days ago. I am referring to the vehement opposition of Congress MP Madan Lal Sharma to the NC's unilateral demand. "We raised the issue during our meeting with the Union Home Minister P Chidambaram. We have made it clear that our party is not in favour of the revocation of AFSPA from any part of the state. They (NC leaders) have their own viewpoint on the issue. But we have made it clear to the Home Minister that we are not in favour of any such move," senior Congress leader and Member Parliament from Jammu and Poonch constituency Madan Lal Sharma had told media persons on April 10 after the meeting between the Home Minister and the Congress delegation consisting of 50 senior Congress leaders, including legislators and ministers, was over.
The moral of the story is that the NC leadership doesn't know how to run a coalition government. It's time for the JKPCC to call the NC's bluff and prove that it is an equal partner in the state government by telling it that it just can't rake up any issue without its consent. |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
| |
| |
|
|
|
|
 |
|
|
|
|
STOCK UPDATE |
|
|
 |
| BSE
Sensex |
 |
| NSE
Nifty |
|
|
| |
CRICKET UPDATE |
|
|
|
|
| |
| |
|
|
| |
|
|
|
|
| |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
