Basharat, Imran ‘resign’ as allocation of portfolios triggers typhoon in Mehbooba’s Govt

One Minister upset over insignificant portfolio, another Minister senses ‘conspiracy within’, writes letter to CM

Ahmed Ali Fayyaz

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JAMMU, Feb 17: Induction of the PDP heavyweight Syed Altaf Bukhari back into Cabinet after his virtual suspension for over ten months, followed by resultant reshuffle of portfolios among five Ministers on Friday, triggered a major crisis in the ruling Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) as two Cabinet Ministers —Syed Basharat Bukhari and Imran Raza Ansari—tendered their resignation. Some MLAs of the PDP earlier stayed away from the swearing-in ceremony.

The Government chose to remain mute but well-placed political and bureaucratic sources maintained that Basharat sent a written and signed communication to Chief Minister Mehbooba Mufti complaining to her that the change of his portfolio from Revenue to Horticulture was the culmination of a "protracted conspiracy” against him within the party. He is said to have asserted that his continuation in the Council of Ministers in the current circumstances would be very difficult and he, as such, should be relieved of his responsibility as a Minister.

Sources confirmed that Basharat’s letter reached the Chief Minister and she would deal with it "as per her own wisdom and judgment".

Even as many of the politicians and bureaucrats insisted that Basharat resigned for losing out a prestigious portfolio and getting an insignificant one, participants of the swearing-in ceremony told STATE TIMES that the Minister was visibly incensed and returned in a huff as the security staff at Raj Bhawan entrance did not allow in four of his guests who did not carry any invite for the ceremony. He turned back in protest along with PDP’s Rajya Sabha member Fayaz Ahmad Mir.

Dozens of attempts to speak to Basharat failed as he did not respond to phone calls from this correspondent. His phone was found continuously “busy”. However, a television network and a Srinagar-based news agency claimed to have accessed the Minister. They reported that the Minister confirmed his resignation and having written a letter to the Chief Minister. The letter reportedly detailed a sequence of the "conspiracies" against the Minister. Basharat is PDP's MLA from Sangrama (Baramulla) in his third successive term after a stint as MLC. He was Minister of Law in Mufti Mohammad Sayeed's Cabinet.

In quick succession, reports said that PDP's first term MLA from Pattan (Baramulla) and Minister of Youth Services and Sports, Information Technology and Technical Education, Imran Raza Ansari, too resigned from the Cabinet. Even as there was no official confirmation to it, Ansari’s family sources told STATE TIMES that he had tendered his resignation around 5.00 pm. However, sources in CM’s bureaucratic and security detail insisted that Ansari’s resignation had not reached to the Chief Minister till late on Friday evening.

Since his induction into the Cabinet, first by late Mufti Mohammad Sayeed in March 2015 and later by Ms Mufti in April 2016, Ansari is known to have been dissatisfied over allocation of an “insignificant portfolio” to him. Some political sources insist that he had been lately assured that the Chief Minister would redress his grievance and allot an important portfolio (CAPD) to him on the day of Altaf Bukhari’s induction. He was reportedly upset when the allocation of portfolios was made public on Friday. However, Ansari was not reachable for confirmation.

Significantly, a number of the PDP’s “angry and disappointed” MLAs were conspicuously absent at the swearing-in ceremony earlier. They included MLA Chadoura Javed Mustafa Mir, MLA Noorabad Abdul Majid Paddar and MLA Sonwar Mohammad Ashraf Mir who were Ministers in Mufti’s Council of Ministers but were, along with Altaf Bukhari, not taken by Mehbooba Mufti last year. Ashraf Mir was reportedly in Mumbai or Bengaluru. PDP’s Kokernag MLA Abdul Rahim Rather was also absent.

Reports said that Rather and Paddar had conveyed their "disappointment and displeasure" to Chief Minister while complaining that “all the defeated candidates” had been rehabilitated and given status of a Minister or Minister of State but the winners had been exposed to embarrassment within their respective constituencies.

The crisis in the PDP has sprouted days before Ms Mufti is leaving for Umrah in Saudi Arabia with a heavy family entourage including her mother, sister and other relatives. One of the bureaucrats of her Government returned on Friday after making necessary arrangements for the CM’s pilgrimage in Saudi Arabia.

END

[STATE TIMES]

Kulgam tense after 4 militants, 2 civilians, 2 soldiers died in gunfight

Gun salute, Pak flags mark militants’ funeral as thousands gather for demonstration; 18 civilians, 3 soldiers injured

Ahmed Ali Fayyaz

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JAMMU, Feb 12: In the current year’s fiercest encounter in Jammu and Kashmir, four local militants, two civilians and two soldiers got killed in Kulgam —one of the politically hypersensitive zones in southern Kashmir on Sunday.

Director General of Police, Dr Shesh Pal Vaid, told STATE TIMES that the operation was launched jointly by Kulgam District Police, Rashtriya Rifles 1^st battalion and CRPF 18^th battalion on specific information regarding the presence of a group of militants at Nagbal Frisal in Kulgam district late on Saturday night. During the operation, a fierce encounter took place in which four terrorists of Lashkar-e-Tayyiba and Hizbul Mujahideen, besides two soldiers and two civilians got killed.

IGP Kashmir, Syed Javid Mujtaba Gillani, said that three militants managed to escape from the cordoned house and others holed up in the hideout attempted to escape while directing heavy gunfire on the Police and security forces. Two soldiers, identified as Raghuvir Singh and Bandoriya Gopal Singh, got killed in the nightlong gunfight while as three more soldiers sustained injuries. IGP said that the house-owner Ashfaq Majid Rishi got killed in the cross-firing as he could not be evacuated successfully. Later, during a clash between the local demonstrators and the security forces, one more civilian, namely Mushtaq Ibrahim Itoo s/o Mohammad Ibrahim Itoo of Hatigam, Srigifwara, got killed.

IGP said that an investigation had been launched into the circumstances that led to the death of the second civilian during the course of a clash. He said that 18 civilians sustained injuries during the clashes. Out of them four had been referred to SMHS Hospital, Srinagar. Doctors at SMHS said late on Sunday night that a civilian, Danish Nazir of Frisal, reported for treatment with a gunshot injury.

The militants killed in the encounter have been identified as Farooq Ahmad Bhat s/o Abdul Gani Bhat r/o Chak Dasand [initially identified as Farooq Ahmad Dar s/o Mohammad Yousuf Dar r/o Arreh], Mohammad Younis Lone s/o Ghulam Qadir Lone r/o Hawura (Hizbul Mujahideen], Mudasir Ahmad Tantray alias Aasim s/o Mohammad Akbar Tantray r/o Redwani and Vakil Ahmad Thokar s/o Mohammad Ahsan Thokar r/o Hadigam.

Officials said that two AK rifles, two pistols and one INSAS rifle, believed to be one of the weapons snatched away from Police at different places last year, were recovered from the site of the encounter.

Commander of Sector-1 of Army, Brig R. Chakravarty held a press conference to claim that the forces made every possible attempt to evacuate the house owner but failed as the militants did not listen to appeals to surrender and come out. He said that large number of people gathering around the encounter sites and clashing with the forces was continuing to be a major problem.

Sources said that one of the four militants had lately joined militancy as he had disappeared from his home on January 14^th. Others had been reportedly active in Anantnag-Kulgam belt in the last two years. Younis Lone, according to Police records, stood booked in four FIRs including one murder and one attempted murder.

While the troops withdrew and carried all the four militants’ bodies to a Police post at Wanpoh, hundreds of residents of about a dozen surrounding villages gathered at the encounter site at Pandit Mohalla, Nagbal, and began clashing with Police and security forces amid anti-India and pro-Azadi slogans. During this clash, one demonstrator, Mushtaq Ibrahim Itoo, sustained critical injuries and later died at a hospital.

Officials as well as the civilians from the tense Kulgam belt told STATE TIMES that thousands of people attended the four militants’ and the two civilians’ funeral prayers at different places. They were all buried in their respective residential villages. The participants waved Pakistani flags and shouted anti-India and pro-Azadi slogans. In the evening, at least two armed militants appeared at Redwani and paid gun salute to the two militants buried in the village graveyard.

There was no official announcement of curfew but residents said that nobody was being allowed to move around and it was a curfew-like situation in a vast area. While as the separatists have called for total shutdown in Kashmir on Monday, sources said that the hardliner Syed Ali Shah Geelani was likely to extend the call for shutdown for one or two days.

END

[STATE TIMES]

Mehbooba wants them as Range Officers, her Govt wants them as Forest Guards

Lal Singh’s ‘Rehbar-e-Janglaat’ scheme is a shot in the leg for Forestry graduates as a woman with Ph D will be paid Rs 5,000/month for 5 years and thereafter regularised as Forest Guard

Ahmed Ali Fayyaz

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JAMMU, Feb 8: Forest Minister Choudhary Lal Singh seemed to be doing a great favour to both, his departments  as well as the 500-odd unemployed Forestry graduates, on January 30 as he was seen insisting Chief Minister announce in her speech in the Assembly the much-hyped ‘Rehbar-e-Janglaat’ scheme. “I am coming to that. I am coming to Rehbar-e-Janglaat”, Chief Minister retorted and committed on the floor of the House that her Government would soon engage “all the highly educated Forestry graduates against the vacancies in the Forest Department”.

Even as Ms Mufti’s Ministers later assured the unemployed Forestry graduates that the PDP-BJP coalition was going to end their decade-long trauma and they would be absorbed in the Forest Department (Territorial) and 10 related departments as Range Officers (ROs), STATE TIMES has learned that the ‘Rehbar-e-Janglaat’ scheme is nothing but death without poison for the unemployed Forestry graduates.

Chief Minister is perceived to be reasonably compassionate and in favour of recruiting all the unemployed youths with B. Sc Forestry, M. Sc Forestry and Ph. D Forestry on the positions commensurate with their high qualification and technical training. Knowing that there have been no technical recruitments, with just a few exceptions, in Forest sector in the last 32 years in Jammu and Kashmir and all the qualified officers recruited before 1990 are going to retire in the next few years, Chief Minister reportedly wants the unemployed Forestry graduates appointed as Range Officers, Assistant Directors in Forest Protection Force and equivalent posts in State Forest Corporation, Wildlife Protection and other related departments.

However, enquiries by this newspaper revealed that Forest Minister Lal Singh actually wants to engage an army of Forest Guards with qualifications ranging from Matriculation to Doctorate in Forestry against paltry remuneration of Rs 5,000 a month for 5 years. Thereafter, they will be ‘regularised’ as Forest Guards [Rs 5200 —Rs 20,200; Grade Pay Rs 1900]. This is equal to a junior assistant and just a minor level above the class 4^th Orderly and Chowkidar. Range Officers’ pay scale is Rs 9,300—Rs 34,800; Grade Pay Rs 4280.

Officials in the office of Principal Chief Conservator of Forest (PCCF), A.K. Singh, disclosed to this newspaper that Forest Minister has recently requisitioned compilation of a list of all Forest Guard vacancies.

“As of now, Minister wants to engage 500 or 600 people with qualification of Matriculation, 12^th Pass and Graduation/PG in Forestry as need-based Forest Guards who would be subsequently regularised as Forest Guards after 5 years. There’s no plan of recruiting anybody as Range Officer or ACF for which the Forestry graduates are qualified and trained. They are just misleading these people with their lies”, said a senior officer on condition of anonymity. He said that no vacancy was referred to PSC and no steps were afoot to fill up vacancies of Assistant Directors in Forest Protection Force or Managers in State Forest Corporation. These have been lying in limbo for decades.

Commissioner-Secretary Forest Mohammad Afzal Bhat has no hesitation to put himself on record. “No, the Government, as of now, has no plans of appointing any of the Forestry graduates as Range Officer, ACF or equivalent. We are just working on so-called Rehbar-e-Janglaat scheme that has been in fact submitted by PCCF some years ago. We have further submitted it to Finance Department. The only vacancies available with us are of Forest Guards. We have worked out that after 5 years, we will be having 1000 to 1200 vacancies of Forest Guards. Under Rehbar-e-Janglaat scheme, we are planning to engage Forestry graduates and above as ‘Rehbar’ and they will be regularised as Forest Guards after 5 years. For 5 years, they will be paid Rs 5,000 per month”, Mr Bhat told STATE TIMES.

“This is Mehbooba Government’s shot in our leg. It would be less cruel if she sprays bullets and shoots us dead. This is the death without poison”, said a 39-year-old unemployed youth who has completed B. Sc Forestry, M. Sc Forestry and Ph. D in Forestry from the year 2000 to 2010. “How can we work at a place where our illiterate Orderlies and Chowkidars will take Rs 20,000 to Rs 30,000 a month and we will be paid Rs 5,000? Besides, people like me will have to be in regular service for just 15 years”, he added.

Commissioner-Secretary Forest Mr Bhat maintained that under the existing recruitment scheme only Forest Guards and Foresters in non-gazetted and ROs Grade-I and Assistant Conservators of Forest (ACFs) in gazetted are directly appointed by Services Selection Board and J&K Public Service Commission respectively. RO Grade-II vacancies are fully reserved for promotion of in-service Foresters. “We have inadequate number of vacancies of Foresters and RO Grade-I. So we have decided to engage them as Forest Guards. Right now the ball is in the court of Finance Department. If there’s a direction from the top, Finance Department in coordination with Planning Department can formulate an innovative scheme”, Mr Bhat asserted.

One of the retired bureaucrats said that the Government could re-organise Forest and Forest-related departments at ACF and RO level. “They can create fresh posts as per the latest requirement. There has been a reorganisation for the comfort of PCCFs, additional PCCFs, CCFs and CFs but in the last 60 years there has been no reorganisation in these departments at ACF or RO level”, he explained. “It is a totally man-made crisis. J&K is a Forest state and currently we need technically trained and highly qualified staff. Currently we have ROs, DFOs and CFs who are totally illiterate in Forestry. Some of them are matriculates. Some have graduation in Arts. And, they too are all retiring in next three years”, he added.

The ‘beneficiaries’ of Mehbooba Government’s largesse will pathetically include Massarat Aziz who has a graduation, post-graduation, a PG diploma and Doctorate in Forestry. Born and brought up in Habbakadal, Srinagar, Massarat is married and settled in Jammu. Currently she works on a temporary arrangement as Technical Assistant in the Government of India-regulated Compensatory Afforestation Fund Management and Planning Authority (CAMPA) in Forest Department for remuneration of Rs 13,500 a month. Under Lal Singh’s scheme, she will be engaged as temporary Forest Guard, paid peanuts of Rs 5,000 a month for 5 years and thereafter regularised as Forest Guard. Her classmates of different Indian states by then would become Professors in Agriculture universities.

“I had a passion for Forestry. My brother is also a Forestry graduate. Out of my four sisters, one has Ph. D in Horticulture and is now working as Gazetted officer in Agriculture Department. Another sister has M. Sc in microbiology and works in Saudi Arabia. Another sister is a doctor at SMHS Hospital in Srinagar and yet another sister is an advocate. Among them all, I am the least earning”, Massarat told STATE TIMES.

“We had high hopes from a lady Chief Minister. But her Minister and bureaucracy have been extremely cruel to us. We can only curse them and our bad luck”, said another female with post-graduation in Forestry.

END

[STATE TIMES]

PDP-BJP coalition’s another dubious first: CAG report not tabled in House

House Committee reports, annual reports of commissions were also not tabled in House; Cabinet kept 17 important Bills pending

Ahmed Ali Fayyaz

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JAMMU, Feb 3: Cabinet spokesperson and Minister of Education Naeem Akhtar’s claim that the Presiding Officers adjourned the Legislature’s budget session sine die a week before the schedule only after ascertaining that “no more important business was still pending”, appears to be remarkably far from truth.

Sources in the Cabinet disclosed to STATE TIMES that the draft of as many as 17 important Bills was supposed to be approved by the Cabinet on February 1^st at 3.00 pm. All these Bills would have come up for consideration and passage in Legislative Assembly, followed by Legislative Council, on the next four days of the Business. Even the Cabinet meeting, of which the agenda had been circulated, could not be convened as Chief Minister Mehbooba Mufti diverted to a party function in Jammu and conveyed her reluctance to chair the same at Civil Secretariat in the afternoon on Wednesday.

“Immediately after the Opposition created ruckus in both Houses of Legislature over the Speaker’s announcement that he would examine the records and expunge if there was anything objectionable in the CM’s Monday speech, it was made clear to both the Presiding Officers that the CM was no more interested in continuation of the session”, sources in the Cabinet said. Taking a cue, Speaker of Legislative Assembly and Chairman of Legislative Council adjourned the session sine die, leaving much of the scheduled business unfinished.

The Budget had been already passed but none of the legislative businesses could be conducted. Even the Question Hour on many days of the session remained completely disturbed.

The Bills which failed to pass through legislation include replacement of J&K Panchayat Raj Ordinance of 2016 which authorises Chief Electoral Officer to conduct Panchayat elections in absence of the State Election Commission. The Commission has not been constituted in Jammu and Kashmir till date. “Since the Ordinance has enough time to expire on completion of six months, we will be able to hold the Panchayat elections in March-April as per the powers given to CEO by the Ordinance”, said a Minister.

Sources in the bureaucracy revealed that the 17 Bills which remained pending for legislation included some of the very important laws.

Even as a motion was adopted by so-called voice vote amid bedlam in the Assembly on Wednesday, none of the Financial Committees like Public Accounts Committee, Estimates Committee and Public Undertakings Committee, could be constituted. Secretary Assembly Mohammad Ramzan agrees that these are statutory panels and need to be constituted with all nominations by the Legislature. He, however, added that Assembly went by the practice of last several years whereby respective political parties submit names of their legislators and the Speaker constitutes the committees accordingly.

Even the all-important annual audition reports of Comptroller and Auditor General of India (CAG) were not tabled in Assembly or Council this time. Secretary Assembly said that it was second time in his memory that such businesses remained unfinished and the reports, including the CAG report, were not tabled. He said similar situation occurred once when Ghulam Nabi Azad was Chief Minister and due to a pandemonium, the Budget session was adjourned sine die in advance by Speaker Tara Chand in 2007 or 2008.

However, former Secretary of Law and Legislative Council, Mohammad Ashraf Mir, asserted that it was for the first time that the CAG reports, besides other annual reports, were not tabled in the Legislature in Jammu and Kashmir.

Secretary Assembly admitted that none of the Assembly’s own House Committee reports or those of J&K State Public Service Commission, J&K State Vigilance Commission, J&K Accountability Commission, J&K State Human Rights Commissions, annual reports of important PSUs and the CAG reports could not be tabled even as all these were ready and available with the Assembly and the Council Secretariat.

Under Article 148 and 149 of the Constitution of India, all the Central reports of CAG have to be tabled in the Budget session of the Parliament and all the State reports in respective State Legislatures.

While the Principal Auditor General (PAG) of Jammu and Kashmir, Mr Huveda Abbas, is currently with a UN audit in United States of America, the Accountant General and incharge PAG, K Subramanium, said that as per the rules and the procedure, he had submitted the CAG reports to Governor several days before the commencement of the Budget session in December 2016.

“Since the State Legislature under rules is the first audience, none of the CAG reports can be made public or published until the same are tabled in the House. Now this has to be done in the next session. Thereafter, these reports will be discussed for remedial actions by the Public Accounts Committee”, Mr Subramaniam told STATE TIMES.

Officials in PAG’s office said that the CAG reports submitted by them had been long back approved by the Governor and forwarded to Assembly and the Council Secretariats through Finance Department. “These could have been tabled any day in the last one month of the session. We fail to understand why the Government waits for the last day of the session”, said an officer.

END

[STATE TIMES]

Delhi’s darling Lisa Curtis tipped to be Trump Govt’s Assistant Secretary of State South Asia

Expert on India-Pakistan matters and terrorism, Curtis, who was recently in J&K, is strongly supported by the BJP top brass including PM Modi and Ram Madhav

Ahmed Ali Fayyaz

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JAMMU, Feb 2: Strongly favoured by Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s party and the Government, New Delhi’s trusted diplomatic darling and the high-profile South-Asia expert, Lisa Curtis, is tipped to be the Trump Government’s Assistant Secretary of State for South Asian Affairs. Her appointment, according to highly placed diplomatic sources in New Delhi, is likely to be announced “within a few days”.

Sources disclosed to STATE TIMES that during her recent visit to India, when she also visited Jammu and Kashmir, Curtis met with top functionaries of the Modi Government and the BJP top brass. Those campaigning strongly but silently for her appointment include the party’s all-important General Secretary and an architect of the PDP-BJP Government in Jammu and Kashmir, Ram Madhav.

“Curtis has a strong support from South Block to the National Security Council. We believe that the Indian diplomacy managers have campaigned for her appointment as Assistant Secretary South Asia. What Robin Raphel (1993) was to Pakistan, Lisa Curtis is to India”, said a senior diplomatic source. He, however, put in a caveat that her appointment was yet to be approved by the new Secretary of State, Rex Tillerson.

A conservative Republican activist, Curtis was reportedly part of the electoral campaign for Donald Trump in the US.

Immediately after the Republic Day ceremonies in Jammu, Curtis met with Chief Minister Mehbooba Mufti, Deputy Chief Minister Dr Nirmal Singh and a number of BJP leaders. She also visited Udhampur and held an extensive interaction with senior Army officers at headquarters of Northern Command. Sources said that the Government also arranged her visit and meetings with victims of the cross-border shelling on this side of International Border and LoC.

Curtis also flew to Srinagar and Gulmarg where, according to well-placed sources, she also met with a top separatist leader with the consent and knowledge of the Centre and the State Government. However, she did not make any such meeting public through social media.

A frequent visitor to J&K, Curtis is a Senior Research Fellow in the Asian Studies Center of the Kathryn and Shelby Cullom Davis Institute for National Security and Foreign Policy at The Heritage Foundation, in the United States of America.

Curtis regularly travels to the South Asia region to participate in conferences. She  has contributed chapters to books and academic journals, including a chapter on India in “Population Decline and the Remaking of Great Power Politics,” edited by Susan Yoshihara and Douglas A. Sylva (Potomac Books, 2011) and an article on Pakistan’s foreign policy in Contemporary South Asia (June 2012).

Before joining The Heritage Foundation in August 2006, Curtis worked for the U.S. government on South Asian issues for 16 years. From 2003 to 2006, she was a member of the professional staff of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, where she was in charge of the South Asia portfolio for the chairman at the time, Senator Richard Lugar, the Republican representative from her State of Indiana.

From 2001 to 2003, Curtis was the White House-appointed senior adviser to the Assistant Secretary of State for South Asian affairs, where she helped develop policy to manage Indo-Pakistani tensions. Before that, she worked as an analyst for the Central Intelligence Agency and, in the mid-1990s, served as a diplomat in the U.S. embassies in Pakistan and India.

In her numerous speeches at international conferences, besides her articles, interviews and panel discussions on the world’s top television channels, Curtis has unequivocally supported the Indian point of view on Pakistan, Kashmir and terrorism.

In a recent article, Curtis argued that the Chinese promised investment on China Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC) had boosted Pakistan’s confidence and spoiled prospects of a dialogue between Islamabad and New Delhi.

“The issue of China and its role in the Indo-Pakistani dispute was raised in a panel discussion on Wednesday at The Heritage Foundation. In that discussion, I mentioned India’s concern that China’s promised $46 billion investment toward CPEC projects in Pakistan has boosted Islamabad’s confidence in its regional position and discouraged it from engaging in dialogue with New Delhi. I further noted that Washington must convince Beijing that if it wants to see the Islamist extremist threat diminished in South Asia, it must convince Islamabad to crack down on terrorist proxies that attack India”, Curtis wrote in her widely read article.

Curtis also supported India’s surgical strikes on the Pakistan-administered terrorist bases across the LoC in Jammu and Kashmir immediately after the fidayeen attack on an Indian Army camp in Uri in September 2016.

“The Indian strikes demonstrate the Modi government’s unwillingness to merely absorb Pakistani provocations. The attack in Uri on September 18 was the second major Pakistani provocation in the space of nine months. In early January, a Pakistan-based terrorist group, the Jaish-e-Mohammad, attacked the Indian air base at Pathankot, just days after Prime Minister Narendra Modi reached out to Pakistan by paying a goodwill visit to Lahore. The Uri attack appeared to show Pakistani willingness to up the ante in order to draw international attention to Kashmir at a time when civil protests had been wracking the region”, Curtis wrote in another article.

END

[STATE TIMES]

PDP’s yet another supreme sacrifice for the coalition with BJP

CM eats the humble pie, escapes to Gulmarg for snow carnival as business terminated dramatically in both Houses of Legislature

Ahmed Ali Fayyaz

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JAMMU, Feb 1: Six days ahead of the schedule and without any consultation with the respective Business Advisory Committees, the budget session in both Houses of the Jammu and Kashmir Legislature was dramatically terminated on Wednesday even as the Leader of Opposition Omar Abdullah claimed on Twitter that the Presiding Officers had received the signal from the Government. This brings to an end high drama in the Legislature over the Chief Minister calling the anti-370 forces as “anti-national” and Speaker Kavinder Gupta saying that he would expunge the adjective not palatable to the BJP from Mehbooba Mufti’s speech.

There has been no confusion or ambiguity over the fact that no political party other than the BJP and its Sangh Parivar constituents has been vociferously struggling for abrogation of the Article 370 of the Constitution of India and other statutory provisions that grant and guarantee special status to Jammu and Kashmir in the dominion of India. Obviously, the Chief Minister and the coalition partner labelling the “forces weakening the Article 370” as anti-national has come as a major embarrassment for the BJP, unluckily ahead of Assembly elections in UP, Punjab and some other States.

Sensing the political deficit, BJP demonstrated tremendous alacrity in media management—it succeeded in playing down the news on TV and in newspapers. It also managed a damage-control action from the Speaker in a desired manner. On Tuesday, Speaker obliged a BJP MLA with his assurance that he would examine the records and expunge from Chief Minister’s speech if there was “anything like anti-national”. His disposal of the BJP MLA’s complaint stirred a hornets’ nest. The Opposition argued it was tantamount to censuring the CM who had lost the moral standing to act as the head of the Government.

In the thick of the hullabaloo, as the Opposition pressed hard that Chief Minister should make a clarification, own or discard what she had said about the anti-370 forces on Monday, Speaker attempted to douse the flames. He said that he had examined the record. “It appears that there was nothing wrong in her intention”, Speaker said without regard to what over 30 cameras had recorded live on Monday. Omar posted relevant part of the video of Mehbooba Mufti’s speech on his Twitter handle, making BJP’s position awkward before a larger audience. He has over 16 lakh followers on Twitter.

Speaker made an unsuccessful attempt to divert the slur to the Kashmiri separatists who, he said, used to exploit things to perpetuate disturbance in the Valley. It was not digestible for the Opposition and media as it is the BJP, not the Hurriyat or any other separatist organisation, that has been gunning for Article 370. In the video Mehbooba is clearly heard and seen as saying that nothing was “as big an anti-national act as weakening Article 370”. She makes her contention absolutely clear that when some forces speak or act against Article 370, the separatists on the prowl in Kashmir exploit it to disrupt peace and create disturbance.

In the videos through internet, Mehbooba endorses Omar Abdullah’s apprehension and assures him that her Government would leave no stone unturned to protect Article 370 and 35-A in the judiciary. She seeks NC’s and other opposition parties’ help in the Legislature to safeguard the State’s special position. This was enough to reclaim a part of the base lost in Kashmir in the last around two years.

However, the BJP lost no time to turn the tables. It succeeded to project that Speaker had expunged the “anti-national” remarks and admonished the Chief Minister. It ruffled a many feathers in the PDP but the party thought it opportune to surrender as it has been reduced to the weakest possible position and, for now, is left with no pigeons in its basket. The party’s crisis managers believe that any confrontation with the BJP could make it lose power at a time when the tempers at home were running terribly high over PDP’s failure to realize a single “pro-Kashmir” promise of the Agenda of Alliance. The other day only, Prime Minister’s office made it clear that the Centre was not going to hand over any of its hydroelectric power projects in Jammu and Kashmir.

Chief Minister’s continued absence from the Legislature for two eventful days, her party’s Ministers and MLAs being mute to the Opposition pandemonium and the BJP’s triumphant tones have significantly added to the PDP’s troubles and trauma. It remains to be seen if some ground could be reclaimed with some pro-people measures and decisions like providing jobs to the unemployed youths on the fast track and unleashing a visible developmental initiative across the Valley.

END

[STATE TIMES]

Speaker’s 3 statements in 3 hours make CM’s position more awkward

BJP high command wants Mehbooba to make ‘clarification’; no official release from Assembly Secretariat, Information Department

Ahmed Ali Fayyaz

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JAMMU, Jan 31: Speaker Kavinder Gupta’s treatment to Chief Minister’s speech in Assembly, in reaction to the BJP MLA Rajiv Jasrotia’s objection to a part of her statement, has obviously made Ms Mehbooba Mufti’s position awkward in the State Legislature as well as the Government. The first casualty on Tuesday became a scheduled Cabinet meeting which was cancelled even after circulation of the agenda.

In her key speech on the grants of her departments, Mehbooba had, for the first time during PDP’s coalition with the BJP, labelled the votaries of the abrogation of Article 370 as “anti-national”. According to her it was the “biggest anti-national act” to seek abrogation of Article 370 that grants special status to J&K in the Constitution of India and serves as a link between the State and the Centre.

With elections in some crucial States drawing nearer, Mehbooba’s remarks are understood to have come as a major embarrassment for the BJP. Since decades, BJP has been the key sponsor of the movement for abrogation of Article 370. It is also alleged to be behind two writ petitions against the State flag and Article 35-A. Apparently under the instructions of his party high command, Jasrotia sought expunction of CM’s “anti-national” remarks, asserting that the BJP, the erstwhile Jan Sangh leader Syama Prasad Mookerji and the MLA’s own family had struggled and given sacrifices for abrogation of Article 370.

“How could we all be anti-national?” Jasrotia asked on the floor of the Assembly. He urged Speaker to order deletion of CM’s remarks. Speaker responded to him favourably and said that if there was anything anti-national in CM’s speech that would be expunged. With this, Speaker stirred a cornets nest as the entire Opposition, led by National Conference MLA and acting President and the former Chief Minister Omar Abdullah, created a ruckus. They said it was for the first time that a Speaker had expunged a CM’s remarks and it would tantamount to a motion of no-confidence against the CM.

The House was adjourned by the Speaker for three times as the Opposition demanded the “official position” of the Government. It pressed to know whether the CM had exceeded her brief or the Speaker was wrong in ordering the expunction.

On the second occasion, Speaker said he would check the records and see if there was anything objectionable in CM's speech. On the third occasion, he claimed that he had not expunged anything from CM’s speech. He, however, added that Chief Minister herself needed to make necessary clarification. With nobody from PDP speaking on behalf of the absent CM, opposition maintained its ruckus and Speaker ordered another adjournment.

Even as a barrage of news stories asserted that Speaker’s action had triggered a storm in the coalition, mediapersons did not receive any clarification or official press release on this development either from Assembly Secretariat or from Department of Information of the State Government. With the Assembly being in session, such a statement or clarification from any other forum was unlikely.

Well-placed political sources disclosed to STATE TIMES that a section of the BJP high command was “pretty unhappy” over Ms Mufti’s label of “anti-nationals” on her coalition partners. Without speaking to Ms Mufti, important BJP leaders at the Centre established contact with the State party leaders and asked them to seek a clarification from Chief Miniter. They made clear that Ms Mufti should withdraw her phrase of “anti-national” that had made BJP’s position awkward in several States preparing for Assembly elections.

However, Ms Mufti, according to sources, declined to make any statement or clarification pleading that it would erode her credibility and make the already hostile ground harder for her party in the Valley. “We can’t be seen as making surrender after surrender to the BJP. We are already in the eye of a storm and the Panchayat and Lok Sabha by-elections in Kashmir are not far away”, said a senior PDP leader.

With no clarification pouring in from Department of Information, the PDP leader claimed to STATE TIMES that today’s Cabinet meeting was cancelled only because of the Speaker’s “uncharitable action” and the BJP building a stand for abrogation of Article 370.  He said that notwithstanding the discomfiture, some leaders in both the parties were in favour of playing down today’s developments. “We are told that the BJP has barred its vociferous MLAs, including Ravinder Raina and Rajeev Jasrotia from making any statement to the Press.

Towards the last moments of Tuesday’s mayhem, Speaker came out with the third statement. This time around he claimed that he had not ordered any expunction of CM’s speech. “Let her make a clarification”, Speaker said. However, rather than going to the Assembly, Chief Minister, who was in her office, drove straight to PDP’s Jammu office in Gandhi Nagar to attend a party function.

The problem for the coalition is that both, Ms Mufti’s speech as well as Speaker’s verbal order over Jasrotia’s demand, have been recorded on over 30 cameras. Reports indicate that the Opposition would again on Wednesday rake up the issue and press hard for PDP’s and BJP’s clarifications.

END

 [STATE TIMES]