Amidst growing clamour for president rule and tension between the two ruling coalition partners of Jammu and Kashmir, Chief minister Mehbooba Mufti will meet Prime Minister Narendra Modi today in New Delhi.
Mufti is in Delhi to attend the chief ministers’ meeting of the states, where BJP is in power or in the coalition. According to the reports, the J & K CM has sought for an appointment to meet Modi.
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The recent upsurge of violence and turmoil in the valley has taken more than 10 lives. The controversy surrounding the army and the stone pelters have also increased the bitterness among the political leaders in the ruling coalition.
The recent statement by senior BJP leader and Industries Minister Chandra Prakash Ganga, saying that bullets should be used against the stone pelters have created uproar in the valley.
The BJP-PDP gulf widened further on Thursday after BJP General Secretary and point man on Jammu and Kashmir affairs, Ram Madhav, justified the army’s action of tying a youth to the bonnet of a jeep as a human shield in Budgam district.
Many senior PDP leaders are visibly upset with BJP’s attitude and many of the view that PDP should come out of the coalition.
BJP and PDP leaders had a meeting last week to sort out the internal issue but nothing positive came out of the meeting. The BJP leader Ram Madhav also met the Governor last week.
Protests broke out in universities, colleges and schools of the Valley over the Pulwama incident. For the last five days, teaching in these institutions has remained suspended. In order to kerb the unrest government has curtailed Internet services in the valley and was planning to ban popular social media sites in coming days.
With these developments, Mehbooba finds herself between the proverbial rock and a hard place where her responsibilities as the Chief Minister and those as a pro-Kashmiri mainstream leader ironically appear at loggerheads with each other.
While the opposition and many in BJP think that Mehbooba has failed to come out as a strong leader in the valley. Among these doubts and agitations, the clamour for president rule is also growing.
Now the question is whether today’s meeting between Prime minister Modi and Chief minister Mehbooba Mufti would be able to find any light at the end of this long and dark tunnel?