Srinagar/ New Delhi: Former Jammu and Kashmir Chief Minister and National Conference Chairman Farooq Abdullah on Tuesday lashed out at the Central government over scrapping of Article 370 and accused Union Home Minister Amit Shah of lying about his situation.
“People are being locked up, (former Chief Minister) Omar Abdullah is in jail. We are not grenade-throwers or stone-pelters. My India is a democratic, secular India for all. We believe in peaceful resolution for change. This is undemocratic,” Abdullah told reporters from the terrace of his house.
The National Conference chief also asked if the government after dividing Jammu and Kashmir, “will divide hearts too”.
On the Central government’s decision to scrap Article 370, he said that this is unconstitutional. “It is dictatorship by Modi government. We have never been the ones who want to separate nor do we want to separate from this nation. But, don’t take away our honour and dignity… we are not slaves,” he said.
“Dictatorial authority has been evoked and not a democratic one. I don’t know how many have been arrested. Nobody is allowed to come in or go out, we are under house arrest,” he said.
Abdullah said that the doors of his house have been closed and he can not move out.
“The HM is lying,” he said in response of Amit Shah informed in the Parliament that “he has not been detained or arrested and is at his house at his own will”.
The former Jammu and Kashmir chief minister said he “broke the door” to come out and speak to the media.
“I heard the statement of the home minister of India that Farooq Abdullah is free and is staying in the house out of his own will. I thought how can he be lying when a DSP has been placed outside my house and no one can come in and no one can go out,” he told Times Now TV channel.
Responding to NCP’s Supriya Sule in Lok Sabha, Union Home minister Amit Shah said,”he (Abdullah) is neither under detention nor under arrest. He is at his home on his own will.”
When Sule wondered whether the National conference leader was unwell, Shah said it was up to the doctors to say. “I can’t carry out the treatment, it was up to doctors,” he said.
Abdullah broke down while speaking to NDTV about the government’s decision and said,”they divided regions, will they divide hearts too? Will they divide Hindus and Muslims? I thought my India was for all, everyone who believes in secular, unity.” “For 70 years we have fought the battle and today we are supposed to be the culprits,” he said.
The Articles 370 and 35A were guaranteed by the government of India, he asserted. Abdullah, 81, said he knows only of his son Omar Abdullah and another former CM Mehbooba Mufti’s arrest that too through the media.
“There is no written order but we have been placed under house arrest. We believe in law, we are not stone pelters or killers. We have never used the path of gun. We have always used Mahatma Gandhi’s way…Why was this done? What was the need,” he said.
“If it (the developments in J&K) is going according to the Constitution why the home minister could not wait when the matter is with the Supreme Court of India. Article 370 is not a presidential order, it is a constitutional guarantee,” Abdullah said. (PTI)
