Lone walks out over ‘UT’ mention in J&K bill, CM Omar Abdullah puts onus on Centre

SRINAGAR/JAMMU: Opposition MLASajad Lone walked out of the J&K assembly Tuesday objecting to the words “J&K UT” (

Union Territory

) in the first bill brought and passed by the Omar Abdullah-led National Conference (NC) govt, saying it endorsed the “catastrophic event” of Article 370’s abrogation.
Peoples Conference member Lone was joined by PDP MLA Waheed Parra, who argued that the bill to “normalises the Aug 5 (2019) changes by putting a stamp” on them.
CM Omar asserted that J&K was a “UT, whether we like it or not” and would remain so “until Parliament gives us back our statehood”. “Therefore, let us not do politics over something like this,” the chief minister said.
Sometime after Lone left, the assembly witnessed chaotic scenes after leader of opposition, BJP’s Sunil Sharma, demanded a response from the govt on demands for regularisation of protesting daily wagers working in the PHE department for a long time. Upset with deputy CM Surinder Choudhary’s answer that BJP had failed to resolve the issue in the last decade, all saffron party MLAs walked out.

The standoff with Lone occurred when the govt introduced the bill to amend J&K Goods and Services Tax (GST) Act. “Did they ask the assembly when Article 370 was abrogated, when Article 35A was abrogated? Why are they asking the assembly now to passively endorse what will eventually be interpreted by history as an active endorsement of the act of relegating J&K to a UT,” Lone contended.
Launching a scathing attack on NC, Lone said the governing party’s pre-election narrative was around “undoing the catastrophic events of 5 Aug 2019” when Parliament abrogated Article 370 and split the erstwhile J&K state into UTs of J&K and Ladakh. “The idea was that the assembly will unambiguously pass resolutions rejecting all actions of Aug 5. Till date, we have not passed anything clear, concise and unambiguous,” Lone said.
Speaker Abdul Rahim Rather tried to pacify Lone, saying the bill’s passage was a routine legislative matter and did not tantamount to ratification of the abrogation.
Omar intervened at this stage, claiming Lone and Parra were relying on “WhatsApp forwards”. “We all have got this WhatsApp forward which states if this bill (GST) is passed, J&K will become UT. But we are UT. This is the govt of UT of J&K,” Omar said.
Omar called the objections an attention-grabbing tactic. “We took oaths of the UT assembly, fought UT elections. We are here to pass the UT Assembly budget and we just now passed the appropriation bill of UT of J&K, which you supported,” Omar said, referring to Lone and Parra.
The CM pointed out that his first cabinet meeting, after taking oath last Oct, had passed a resolution for restoration of J&K’s statehood and he handed it over to PM Narendra Modi himself. Omar said he had conveyed in every meeting in Delhi that UT status was not accepted to people of J&K.