As Chief Minister Mehbooba Mufti in the aftermath of the killing of 13 militants and four civilians in South Kashmir gunfights and post gunfight clashes last week said “Every day it breaks my heart to see a wailing mother beckoning her son to return. So can we leave aside our accusations & counter accusations, put our heads together to save these young ones”, the BJP President Amit Shah told reporters in Mumbai “maximum number of terrorists have been killed in Kashmir during the reign of PDP-BJP coalition government” and these words of the BJP Chief are sufficient enough for the Chief Minister to understand the saffron party’s outright denials of concessions to her government either on dialogue over Kashmir or the counter militancy measures pursued in valley . The hints dropped by both the Modi government at the central and the BJP top brass in Delhi are sufficient enough to endorse the general public view in Kashmir that “north poles meeting south poles” as claimed by PDP patron and former Chief Minister late Mufti Mohammad Sayeed is proving a hoax. Ironically the BJP President Amit Shah made the highly provocative remarks over militant killings in Kashmir few hours after chief minister Mehbooba Mufti while congratulating BJP on its foundation day had in one of her tweets said ‘PM Modi would try to win trust, hearts and minds of the people of Kashmir’. The utterances of Amit Shah are sufficient enough to convey it to Chief Minister Mehbooba Mufti that saffron party has got into the election mode and there is not even the remotest possibility of BJP tending to make a drastic shift in its stand on Kashmir. In fact BJP President Amit Shah’s assertion is clear reflection of the Kashmir policy pursued by the saffron party likely to hold reigns of power at the central at least for one more year from now onwards.
Not only the statements but the actions of the BJP ministers in both the state and at the centre on both military measures pursued in Kashmir and special status of the state show intents of the saffron party in pursuing its own agenda in Jammu and Kashmir state.
The BJP’s central leaders as usual continue to issue provocative statements both on the continuing militant and civilian killings in Kashmir valley and Chief Minister Mehbooba Mufti is yet to react to even a single provocative remark of any senior BJP leader. Not only the statements but the actions of the BJP ministers in both the state and at the centre on both military measures pursued in Kashmir and special status of the state show intents of the saffron party in pursuing its own agenda in Jammu and Kashmir state. Recently two BJP ministers of the Mehbooba government Lal Singh and Chander Prakash Ganaga attended a rally of Hindu Ekta Manch called for supporting the criminals responsible for the rape and murder of a minor bakerwal muslim girl in Kathua district but the BJP central high command did not bother to issue even a simple show cause notice to either of the two ministers who spoke against the decision of the Mehbooba led cabinet of which they are a part. By all standards of political understandabilities the central high command of the BJP has pushed Chief Minister Mehbooba Mufti and her Peoples’ Democratic Party into a phase of political isolation in Kashmir valley. With no indication of a major shift in the Kashmir policy the Mehbooba Mufti’s Peoples’ Democratic Party is running out of options to further its prospects of political survival in the fast changing political scenario in Jammu & Kashmir state.
