Srinagar, Aug 5: Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) on Sunday reiterated its pledge to safeguard Jammu and Kashmir’s special status at all fronts, stating that past bears testimony of the fact that party took a strong stand in ensuring a strong and categoric legal recourse to protect 35 A in the Supreme Court.
PDP Chiefspokesman Rafi Ahmad Mir in a statement issued here said that when the party was part of the coalition, it left no stone unturned for the protection of Article 370 and 35-A.
The official records pertaining to the matter could still be evidently reflect that then Chief Minister Mehbooba Mufti directed the state’s Law Department to file the second counter affidavit by the end of July, however after the fall of government on June 19, the filing of the affidavit was the constitutional responsibility of the Governor.
He added that the PDP Chief Mehbooba Mufti met the Governor immediately after the collapse of coalition, to share the concern of people about protecting Article 35 A and the need of a strong legal recourse. He said that top lawyers of the country were engaged back then, to defend the state’s special status in Supreme court with the senior ministers of the party camping in the national capital at the time of the hearings.
He added that ahead of stitching common ground for alliance with the BJP, PDP signed the Agenda of Alliance in which safeguard of state’s unique identity remained a top priority and the same was admitted in the country’s top court as ground of status quo by the Government of India. “The fact of the matter remains that the PDP made every possible effort to thwart any attempt that could have put state’s special position in a comprising position.
“Even during her tenure as the Chief Minister , Mehbooba Mufti is on record to caution the Prime Minister on the floor of the house and later she also met the PM to deliberate on the need of protecting state’s special status’
Mir said that the party is continuing its earnest efforts to protect JK’s special position at all fronts , remarked the PDP Chief Spokeman while cautioning that any fiddling with state’s special position is fraught with the dangerous consequences and could turn the state into a veritable inferno, leaving all thepeace building measures of the past in tatters. “It is a high time that instead of a confrontational attitude, the central government needs to put its best foot forward and explore the ways that could make peace an inseparable feature of the state” said Rafi Mir.
