Door to door campaign reflects changed security scenario, asserts Arun Gupta

JAMMU: The National Conference and the Congress are busy these days, day in and day out hurling abuses at the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP). They are able to campaign for much longer hours of the day, be it day or night. Some days ago, in Kashmir’s Zadibal assembly segment, NC patriarch Farooq Abdullah sat in open auto-rickshaw along with his party candidate Tanvir Sadiq and roamed on the streets of downtown Srinagar freely.

These were areas out of bounds for politicians and considered hotbeds of terrorism. Dr Farooq Abdullah was canvassing support for his party and talking ill about the BJP government led by Prime Minister Narendra Modi accusing it of not doing enough for the locals.

If we just sit back, watch carefully and analyse closely, we will realise that something like this, door to door campaigning by top leaders, was happening in Kashmir in 2024 assembly elections for the first time after 1987. It was during Farooq Abdullah’s tenure as CM when he led the NC-Congress coalition that terrorism started in late 1989 and early 1990. It was the rampant corruption, mismanagement and high handedness of his government that created fertile ground for terrorism, BJP spokesperson Arun Gupta said on Sunday.

We then need to go a step further into trying to make sense of all this door-to-door campaign and lack of fear among the candidates as also common people. How is it that something like this has become possible and who is responsible for this pleasant change? On looking back into the recent past, we realise that all these positive changes have happened after August 5, 2019, abrogation of Article 35-A and 370, Mr Gupta pointed out.

In all elections held after 1987 when Farooq Abdullah was the CM, be it of the elections for the Lok Sabha, Legislative Assembly, or even panchayat or local bodies, rampant violence was witnessed. Killing of common people as also of contesting candidates of different parties was common, Mr Gupta pointed out. Stone pelting incidents and hartals were witnessed all over the Kashmir valley leading to repeated disruptions in all sectors. The hartals led to closure of educational institutions, businesses suffered, tourism and industry suffered too, he added.

These repeated closures harmed the economy tremendously and created a fear psychosis where no investor was willing to put his money into Jammu & Kashmir. In 1997, Farooq Abdullah sought investments from all over India and even abroad but was rebuffed soundly. The potential investors were requested to invest hundreds or thousands of crores into J&K but could not own an inch of land in their names. They were told that they should create jobs for thousands of people of J&K but they could not own any houses and had to live as tenants permanently, Mr Gupta recalled.

This put off many would-be investors who said if they were being asked to invest in J&K, they should at least be allowed small patches of land for their personal needs also as residences. Since Article 35-A and 370 were in force, allotting land even for residential purposes to ``outsiders’’ (as defined by the NC, Indians from other states) was not possible and would-be investors had to be turned away, Mr Gupta said. Today, investment proposals worth thousands of crores have been received and many industrial estates are being set up all over J&K, he said.

The NC should give up on its agenda of uselessly talking about restoration of these articles which have been buried forever. It should thank PM Modi and admit without hesitation that he has changed the ground realities and hence the perceptions about J&K, not only domestically, but also globally, he concluded.