Srinagar: National Conference president Farooq Abdullah on Monday sought the intervention of Prime Minister Narendra Modi after reports emerging from Saudi Arabia indicated India’s Hajj quota has been abruptly slashed.
The former Union minister said every Muslim dreams to go on the Hajj pilgrimage at least once in a lifetime.
“I would like to request the prime minister to take up the matter as he is close to the country (Saudi Arabian leadership,” Abdullah told PTI Videos at his residence here.
He was responding to a question about some opposition leaders flagging the issue on Sunday even as there was no official word from the government on the matter so far.
“He (the prime minister) should urge them (the Saudi Arabia leadership) that this issue is related to thousands of people… they save money so that they can go on this holy pilgrimage. It is a dream of every Muslim to go there,” the former chief minister said.
Asked about the recently implemented Waqf (Amendment) Act, Abdullah said his party has already made its stance clear that it is against the law.
“This (Act) is against the Constitution and we had appealed that it should be reconsidered. Now our party, with other like-minded parties, has moved the Supreme Court and we hope we will get justice,” he said.
He also defended J&K Assembly Speaker Abdul Rahim Rather not allowing a discussion in the House on the act, saying “the discussion on Waqf Amendment Act did not happen in the Assembly as the matter is already in the Supreme Court”.
“The Speaker already gave his verdict and it was right on his part because when we are approaching the Supreme Court, there is no point talking about it,” he said.
On opposition calling the pandemonium witnessed in the last three days of the budget session in Jammu from April 7 to 9 as a “fixed match”, the NC president said “has the opposition ever introspected?”
“Who is responsible? Who converted Auqaf into the state Waqf Board? It was the property of Muslims living here. Article 370 would not have been abrogated had they not shaken hands with the Centre (BJP),” he said without naming the People’s Democratic Party (PDP) headed by Mehbooba Mufti.
The NC president was referring to changing the Jammu and Kashmir Muslim Auqaf Trust to state-owned Jammu and Kashmir Waqf Board during the chief ministership of PDP founder Mufti Mohammad Sayeed in 2003.
Accusing the BJP of targeting Muslims, he said, “The government at the Centre has always been targeting Muslims to win elections by doing Hindu-Muslim politics. Until they stop spreading hatred, this country is in danger.”
On recent encounters between terrorists and security forces in different parts of the Jammu region, Abdullah said the BJP was saying that Article 370 was responsible for terrorism in Jammu and Kashmir but those provisions are gone now.
“It is the neighbouring country (Pakistan) which is doing this. We appealed to them to stop it and to let us live in peace so that we can move forward and progress in our lives but that is not happening,” he said, adding he does not know what is the solution to this problem.
“They (BJP) are not even ready to talk (to Pakistan),” Abdullah said.
Asked about the recent tariff hike by the US, he said President Donald Trump has his own way of handling things. “For him, America comes first.”
Abdullah also said he had no idea about NC leader and member parliament Aga Ruhullah named in an FIR filed by the Anti-Corruption Bureau in a land scam last week.
“I do not know why the notice was sent to him,” he said.
