SRINAGAR: For the first time since assuming office in Oct 2024, J&K chief minister
Omar Abdullah on Monday admitted his optimism regarding the restoration of statehood was fading.
“I was hopeful from day one about the restoration of statehood,” he said. “Now, the hope has diminished. The longer you keep us waiting and delay statehood, the less hopeful we’ll be,” Omar said while interacting with reporters in his office at J&K Assembly, which is in session currently.
Asked about reports claiming he would step down as CM if J&K’s statehood was not restored within a fixed period, Omar refused to comment. On Sunday, he had said in an interview that he had set for himself a finite time frame wherein, if statehood was not restored, he would resign. Omar skirted the topic on Monday.
He, however, insisted that lack of statehood was becoming a hurdle for the elected govt to function. “Am I mad to ask for statehood if there are no hurdles in executing our work? If it were easy to work in a Union Territory, then all states of the country would have asked for becoming UT and we wouldn’t even be talking about statehood,” he said.
Mentioning some of the hurdles, the CM said officers were not posted according to the govt’s choice, and several departments that should have been under the control of the elected govt are not were not with it.
Omar also took on the assembly speaker, Abdul Rahim Rather, who refused discussion on the arrest of AAP MLA Mehraj Malik after BJP members insisted that the case sub was judice.
Dismissing allegations of a “secret understanding” with BJP, he said maintaining cordial ties with the Centre was essential “so that the work of governance continues smoothly”, but asserted that “NC has no ties with BJP, and it never will have”.
He further said NC was the only party that was taking on BJP in J&K. “We were the only ones who challenged them in the Rajya Sabha election... In the Nagrota bypoll, both Congress and PDP decided not to contest. The only party standing up to the BJP there is the NC,” he said.
As two of his party MPs, Aga Syed Ruhullah Mehdi and Mian Altaf Ahmed, criticised his governance style on Sunday, the CM said he respected Mian Altaf as a senior colleague and valued his advice immensely. Omar, however, said he did not want to talk about Mehdi, and that there was no comparison between the two MPs.
Mehdi has been extremely critical of Omar and has accused him of abandoning advocacy for Article 370 and betraying people on many promises. The Srinagar MP hit back at the CM saying: “There are thousands of people languishing in jails and he (Omar) doesn’t know anything about it. The fight for Article 370 is a fight for our existence. We must be informed of what happened in that fight,” the MP Srinagar said.
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