Debate on Article 370 should cease, people want basic issues addressed

JAMMU: The debate on Article 370 is benefitting none, not even to those who have insisted on the restoration of the special status of Jammu and Kashmir with the constitutional guarantees. The right to debate cannot be denied in a democracy but when the end result measured from any stretch of imagination is going to be minus-zero, it should be given up. This is becoming a big hurdle in addressing other urgent issues facing the people of two regions, who voted for redressal of their grievances over the years.

Before coming to the issues that demand urgent attention, it is imperative for the parties insisting on the restoration of Article 370 explicitly or otherwise to understand what they are up against. They are standing up to the Parliament and the Supreme Court. The decisions are well known and by now the whole of the country has adopted the abrogation of Article 370 as something natural and organic, which cannot be overturned by the hyperbolic rhetoric on restoration of something that is near impossible.
Chief Minister Omar Abdullah- a champion of the restoration of the Article 370, scrapped on August 5, 2019 – has told in no uncertain terms that it would not be back as long as the current set-up is in place. It means he knows that Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Union Home Minister Amit Shah will refuse to entertain this idea. This is not any rigidity on the issue. It is all about the parliamentary procedures and their sanctity. The amendments to abrogate this constitutional part was approved and passed with a thumping majority in both the houses of the Parliament. This showed that how the whole country was too eager for this outcome. The national context was there from the very beginning. The sensitivities of the nation took precedence over something that had become redundant over a period of time.
The aggrieved parties – National Conference, PDP, and People’s Conference approached Supreme Court of India with the hope that they would get something out of this effort . The moment any party moves the court and particularly when it is the apex court of the country, it is given that the verdict would be accepted with grace. The Supreme Court, after weeks-long hearing , which the whole nation watched on TV screens , delivered a judgment in favour of the Parliament’s act of abrogating Article 370 . After that the prudence demanded that the whole issue should have been halted. It didn’t happen.
The political parties in Kashmir used it as an election campaign issue. The people in the Valley were not convinced that these parties could do anything, but they wanted to convey a message, which side of the fence they stood. National Conference secured a decisive victory . This victory has been analyzed and interpreted as rejection of the abrogation of Article 370. Is it really so? Perhaps not. The voters also voted for sustaining peace in Kashmir, which had visited the land after decades of trials and tribulations – thousands of lives were lost and lakhs got dislocated. The ruling party should have understood the mixed mandate.
Having done what it did in the Assembly, it is time to put a stop to all the debate on the issue. As of today, it is understood that the resolution so passed is going to be delivered to the Centre to take a call on it. It looks most unlikely that the Centre would take a call on it, but till the time it rejects it officially, it is presumed that the resolution has entered silence zone.
The Omar Abdullah government has so many promises to fulfill. It had promised that the masses would get a better quality of life in which the core issues of basic amenities will be addressed on priority basis. The government should rework on its priorities as the people are looking for jobs, explore avenues of living a dignified life and social harmony. The debate on the Article 370, its merits and demerits only add to uncertainties. This is a material that the workshop of the idlers is looking for. They seek to spread this as part of their agenda in which they undermine all good things that the government thinks of doing that. So, best course is to put a full stop on the debate and get on with its work to deliver on the promise on people’s welfare.