Unwilling to face the reality, NC is busy befooling the people through wrong interpretation of the impugned Article 35A by invoking the vision of Maharaja Hari Singh, the benevolent and visionary ruler of the State, who was forced to abdicate his throne and live in exile by the founder of same party Sheikh Mohammad Abdullah, asserted the Bharatiya Janata Party in a press release issued here today. Reacting to the statement of a local NC leader who had blamed BJP of duping the people of J&K by abrogating Article 370 & 35A, Brig Anil Gupta, Spokesperson of the Party, retorted by saying that it was just the opposite and NC had betrayed the people by making a discriminatory law much opposed to the vision of the Maharaja.
Article 35A was inserted in the Indian Constitution as a result of conspiracy hatched by Sheikh-Nehru duo to promote the Sheikh and side line and weaken the Maharajaempowering the state’s legislature to define ‘permanent residents’ of the state and provide special rights and privileges to those permanent residents. It also debarred the non-permanent residents of the state and other Indian citizens from availing those privileges. The J&K Constitution, which was promulgated by the Constituent Assembly, which had no opposition members but only the NC legislators defined a Permanent Resident (PR) of the state in a manner that it was discriminatory. It also defined the privileges to be enjoyed by the permanent residents. This is where the NC betrayed the vision of Maharaja by selectively adopting the provisions of the 1927 Notification of the Maharaja, asserted Brig Gupta.
While the Notification of 1927 had four categories of State Subjects, NC made it discriminatory by deleting the Class 3 and 4 of State Subjects while defining the PR. Class 3 State Subjects were defined as those who were permanently residing in the state for 10 years continuously and had acquired immovable property under a Rayaatnama may seek citizenship thereafter under an Ijazatnama.This was deliberately omitted by the NC to deny citizenship to Hindu West Pakistan refugees who had migrated to the State from neighbouring areas after the partition, accused Brig Gupta. Class 4 referred to those companies who invest in the state and who contributed to the financial stability of the state could also be given the citizenship by the Maharaja. This was also omitted deliberately. Maharaja was a true visionary but the NC leadership suffered from “tunnel vision,” accused Brig Gupta.
When confronted with reality both NC& PDP took cover quoting Maharaja’s vision but not only misused but twisted and misinterpreted the provisions of Article 35A for promoting their discriminatory politics stated Brig Gupta. It goes to the credit of BJP that this historical blunder has been undone by Modi Government through its epoch-making legislation on 05 August 2019 emphasised the press release.
It is unfortunate but unpardonable the way local NC leadership is misusing the Maharaja’s name to mislead and emotionally exploit the sentiments of Dogra youth while their Valley based leadership continues to demand total reversal of the historical August 5 decision and plunge the state back into the era of separation and terrorism, rued Brig Gupta. The list of misuse in the name of Article 370 & 35A is endless, asserted Brig Gupta.