Fri. Mar 29th, 2024
By IM3847 (Own work) [CC BY-SA 4.0 (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0)], via Wikimedia Commons

The Article 370 gives Jammu and Kashmir the special status. Union Minister of State for Home, Hansraj Gangaram Ahir clarified in the Lok Sabha.

The question was put before him by BJP MP Ashwini Kumar. He asked whether the government was going to scrap Article 370 of the constitution. The MP from Karnal in Haryana also asked what the status and the procedure for Article 370 was. Union Minister, Hansraj Ahir said that no such proposal was under consideration of the government currently.

BJP’s agenda includes getting rid of Article 370 but BJP in alliance with the regional party PDP has been silent on the demand in the Agenda of Alliance that was made in 2015. There were statements made by Dineshwar Sharma the Centre’s interlocutor. He was speaking on the violence in Jammu and Kashmir. Mr. Ahir responded that Sharma had visited the border areas in Kashmir after the recent cease-fire violations. He also suggested certain measures for the local population. The suggestions included moving the residents and the construction bunkers.

Questions were also proposed by Jyotiraditya Scindia and Gaurav Gogoi. Ahir said that the government was eager to bring about peace in Kashmir and is willing to engage in conversations with the sections of the society who were against violence in any form. The government has also been working on policies that will bring the youth to the forefront. The idea is to give them opportunities for employment to steer them away from taking to militancy.

The Article 370 gives Jammu and Kashmir the autonomous status and is recorded in Part XXI of the constitution. In 2014, BJP pledged to integrate the state with the rest of India. In order to do that they were looking to deny Article 370 to the state. Though, in 2015, the Jammu and Kashmir High Court said that the Article 370, can’t be, “abrogated, repealed or even amended.”

By Sahitya