Failure to follow Vajpayee’s ‘roadmap’ led to J&K’s rating downgrade: Omar – Times of India

SRINAGAR: Chief Minister Omar Abdullah on Tuesday heaped praise on “great visionary” Atal Bihari Vajpayee in the meeting, while lamenting that J&K “would not have been where it is today if the former prime minister’s road map” for the region had been followed.
Referring to the abrogation of Article 370 and statehood by the BJP-led Center in 2019, Omar suggested that J&K would not have been relegated if Vajpayee’s roadmap had been followed in spirit. “Unfortunately, the path shown by Vajpayee is deserted halfway and instead of connecting people, distances are created.” National Conference (NC) Vice President and CM said on the second day of the inaugural meeting of J&K as a Union Territory (UT).
Speaking during obituary references to 57 leaders who have passed away in the last decade, Omar struggled to find words to praise the former BJP stalwart. ‘What can I say about late Vajpayee. He was a towering personality who started the Lahore bus and went to Minar-e-Pakistan. He always tried to build friendly ties with Pakistan. He was the one who kept saying that friends can be changed, not neighbors,” Omar said.
The CM recalled Vajpayee’s slogan: “Jhamoriyat, Kashmiriyat and Insaniyat (Democracy, Kashmiri Ethos and Humanity)” exemplifying the ex-Prime Minister’s unparalleled vision. “Maybe he was the first and the last leader to raise this slogan,” Omar said.
The CM reminisced about another instance where the J&K Assembly had passed a resolution calling for greater autonomy more than two decades ago, but which subsequently had to be returned by the Vajpayee-led Cabinet. “But later Vajpayee realized that the decision had been taken in haste. He asked the then Minister of Justice to hold talks with (then ruling) NC leaders. But further progress could not be made. When Vajpayee passed away, things changed drastically,” Omar said.
Monday’s obituaries mentioned MPs from Ladakh and Kargil. Omar noted that this may be the last time the meeting paid tribute to members like Ladakh and Kargil ceased to be part of Jammu and Kashmir after the August 2019 abrogation bifurcated the erstwhile state into two UTs: Ladakh and J&K.
Meanwhile, BJP’s Udhampur East MLA RS Pathania referred to Monday’s controversial move by PDP member Waheed Para to move a resolution against the abrogation of Article 370, which led to chaos in the House. Pathania demanded to know how the media covered the row when a “copy of the resolution did not reach the chairman”. Speaker Abdul Rahim Liever of NC admitted that he had not received the document, but asked Pathania to stick to the references to obituaries. CM Omar called Parra’s move an attempt “to play to the gallery”.