The Bharatiya Janata Party’s (BJP) protest in Srinagar and march toward the Jammu and Kashmir chief minister’s office at the civil secretariat on Wednesday gave the ruling National Conference (NC) an opportunity to hold a parallel protest demanding the restoration of Articles 370 and 35A.
The NC government must answer. For the first time, along with NC workers, dozens of NC legislators led by health and education minister Sakina Itoo held a protest against the Centre and the BJP, blaming them for becoming an impediment in the restoration of statehood, Article 370 and 35A. Even Omar several times said Article 370 won’t get restored under the BJP rule and his focus is on the statehood restoration. However, the protest call against the CM has now given the NC an opportunity to vocally demand restoration of Article 370 and 35A.
The people will not stay silent,” he said. “Today’s message was loud and clear – jobs, transparency, development and accountability, not backdoor deals.
“The very same police that won’t allow the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) to step outside its office to hold a peaceful protest on public issues have facilitated both BJP and NC to protest against each other. The opposition, however, termed it as a fixed match between two parties – one ruling in UT and another in New Delhi. This blatant double standards must be explained, who authorises these selective restrictions and why the law is being applied differently to different political parties,” PDP president and former CM Mehbooba Mufti wrote on X. The BJP, however, also claimed that police used force to disrupt their march. The BJP protest was led by MP and state president Sat Sharma and LoP in the assembly, Sunil Sharma, who blamed the NC government for using police to curtail their protest. “The current government has failed on all fronts. Recently they hiked electricity tariffs despite promising free electricity in their election manifesto.
“The BJP has given the NC a chance to take to the streets for statehood, Article 370, and 35A. With the government’s two years in office nearing completion, it seems the NC leadership has also lost hope, and the BJP’s protest has given them an opportunity to agitate for Article 370. By doing this, the party kills two birds with one stone: first, the protest answers its critics; second, it forces the BJP—which considers Article 370 a closed topic and does not want to protest it—to face the fact that the ruling party has made it a central issue again,” said Haroon Rashid, political analyst and columnist.
Similarly, the ruling party made backdoor appointments at the cost of J&K’s unemployed youth,” Sharma said.
Earlier, NC legislators and even the CM were hopeful that after a landslide victory, they could win statehood back.
