Jammu and Kashmir BJP leader Manzoor Ahmad Bhat visited the Bone and Joint (B&J) Hospital in Srinagar Friday, following which he, in a statement, said that he “reviewed” the functioning of the hospital. He also called for “prompt appointment of the Medical Superintendent” in the hospital.
The BJP’s former media in-charge in the Valley, Bhat currently does not hold any post in the party.
While sources said that Bhat visited the hospital to see a patient and was visibly upset when he asked for a meeting with the Medical Superintendent (MS), which could not materialise because of the acting MS’s busy schedule, the tone and tenor of his statement was seen in a section of J&K political circles as “a reflection of the BJP’s grip on power in the Union Territory despite the elected National Conference (NC)-led government being in place”.
It is such a perceived proximity of the principal Opposition BJP to the power centres in the UT that seem to be fuelling resentment in the ruling NC, which came to the fore Thursday when senior NC leader and J&K Deputy Chief Minister Surinder Choudhary accused the BJP of allegedly running a “proxy government” through Lt Governor Manoj Sinha.
Without taking names, Choudhary said if someone thought that he could “crush the mandate of the people” he would not be allowed because “the government is not scared and is ready to fight for the people”.
In an apparent reference to the BJP, Choudhary alleged: “The government is ours but someone else is running the proxy government.” He said, “People have given us a mandate… but what is happening here today? And that’s why we keep saying that Jammu and Kashmir should get back statehood.”
He also said that some “people will mend their ways” only after the return of J&K’s statehood, which was a thinly-veiled attack on bureaucrats who, NC leaders believe, were taking orders mostly from the Raj Bhawan.
Choudhary’s tirade against Sinha marked the first direct attack of the NC government on the Centre-appointed L-G.
Since October last year, when he took the helm of the NC-led government, CM Omar Abdullah has been treading cautiously in a bid not to upset the Centre amid the party’s hope that it would facilitate in early restoration of statehood to J&K.
Omar did not openly confront the L-G despite various rows like the one that erupted over the transfer of the Kashmir Administrative Service (KAS) and revenue officials by the Raj Bhavan.
However, Choudhary’s open attack indicated the party’s changing position due to its rising frustration over the “conflicting jurisdictional powers” of the elected government and the L-G, even as the Centre has yet to approve the Transaction of Business Rules (TBR) to define their respective powers across the departments.
An NC section believes that Omar’s non-confrontational approach towards the Centre and the Raj Bhawan was “denting” his popularity in the Valley. Some party leaders are also said to be unhappy with his “docile attitude” in running the government.
“We understand that there is a need to make a balanced approach, given that there are dual power centres. We can’t move forward without the Centre’s support,” said an NC leader. “But here it is getting too far, you are asked to bend and you start to crawl. This is not going to help the government or our party. We are losing public respect by doing this.”
An NC legislator said Omar needed to put his “foot down”, saying that there has been “growing anxiety” within the party about the direction the government is taking.
“We know it is very tough to run this government, only the wearer knows where the shoe pinches. But many legislators feel that we need to fight at least where the Raj Bhawan is stepping into our jurisdiction,” said another NC MLA. “The more we are ceding power, the weaker we are becoming. Now, even the bureaucrats feel where the original power lies and they don’t want to annoy the Raj Bhawan. The legislators are not even entertained by the bureaucrats now while the BJP leaders and even its karyakartas have an easy access to the corridors of power, especially bureaucracy.”
An NC leader, however, said that Choudhary’s statement reflected the party’s mood. “The water has gone above the head now and even Omar sahib has spoken about it,” he said. “If the Deputy Chief Minister talks about something, obviously he would have first discussed it with the Chief Minister”.
Some non-BJP Opposition parties, however, claim that the elected government has itself “ceded power to the Raj Bhawan”. “There was a strong mandate to the party (NC) and they had the powers to revoke the laws that were framed during the last five years,” said Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) leader and legislator Waheed Para.
“But they (NC) have ceded the power themselves. They have been saying that the business rules don’t allow this, business rules don’t allow that. They are not fighting for the issues that they were given this mandate for, but instead for transfers. They have reduced themselves to an elected bureaucracy,” Para alleged.
