Mehbooba Mufti, Jammu and Kashmir People’s Democratic Part Chief, said that she was not surprised when the PM, Narendra Modi, called a meeting on Thursday of the political leaders of Jammu and Kashmir. She said that there had been so much of oppression in the region that the centre must have realised that the things were not going the way they had planned.
Mehbooba Mufti’s comments came a day after when Prime Minister held the meeting with top political leaders of J&K at his Delhi residence.
After the abrogation of Article 370 in August 2019 and the bifurcation of J&K into two union territories, this was the first meeting held between the centre and the political leaders of J&K. Mehbooba Mufti wasn’t able to answer as to why she was invited to the PM meet even though she was blamed for being the terror sympathiser. She said that only the PM or Home Minister could tell the reason for her being a part of the meeting.
She mentioned that there had been so much of oppression in J&K that people were unable to breathe, the situation on ground was not what they were portraying to the world and people were unhappy and felt suffocated. She added that the centre might have decided the meet out of empathy for them, so they went out of respect of the office of the PM.
Mehbooba Mufti also said that the meeting was held in cordial atmosphere and the Prime Minister and Home Minister heard their points and now they can only hope that the PM meant when he said to reduce the space between their hearts.
She said that prior to the elections they need to take some confidence building measures as the confidence of people are shattered and there had been many suicides, and J&K had been a region of total depression.
She said that the terrorism has come down but there was still disquiet in the region, and since the day Article 370 and 35A had been scrapped, the people feared that the demographic might change, she added that the jobs must be secured for local youths. She pointed out that the journalists got notices for their reporting resulting in reporters to not report freely, the Security force harassed the people, and unless the Article 370 and 35 A were restored, she would not contest in the elections.
Mehbooba Mufti said that she would not contest in the elections until the Article 370 and 35A were restored because otherwise the people would feel that the resolution of Article 370 was just a slogan and she was doing it for the politics, which was not the case hence she would not contest, she added that for the confidence build measures, they need to release the prisoners apart from the party leaders and the confident rebuilding measures should be taken up.
She said that the Article 370 and 35A were the means for them to have a job security and their identity from J&K, and it was important to them and called J&K the most prosperous state of India. She concluded saying that she agreed that the step to reach out to them by PM and inviting them to Delhi was a welcome measure.
