Onlykashmir.in News Desk
Srinagar/The intervention of senior officials just hours before the debate in the Assembly on the resolution to restore full statehood to Jammu and Kashmir began has created a stir in political and administrative circles.
Chief Secretary Atal Dolo and Law Secretary Achal Sethi sent separate letters to the Assembly Secretariat, taking the position that the matter was sub judice, so the resolution should not be discussed in the House.
The letters came three days after Chief Minister Omar Abdullah moved the resolution and it was passed by the House for debate. The unusual move by top officials has created fresh tension between the elected government and the administration over the legislative body’s authority to act.
Assembly Speaker Abdul Rahim Rather, while talking to NDTV, said that there is no such example in the past where the bureaucracy has written a letter to the Assembly Secretariat to stop the proceedings of the House.
He said that he was not aware of any precedent of officers interfering in the proceedings of the House without the approval of the relevant minister.
At whose behest is the bureaucracy being run?
Srinagar/Chief Minister Omar Abdullah raised strong questions over the letters sent by senior officers to the Assembly Secretariat against the resolution on the restoration of statehood, asking on whose orders the bureaucracy took this step.
Omar Abdullah, who also holds the Law Department portfolio, told the House that he had no prior knowledge about the letters and came to know about the matter only after receiving them from the Assembly Secretariat.
Speaking before the resolution was approved, he said that he was both the Chief Minister and the Law Minister, yet the bureaucracy sent a legal opinion against the resolution he presented, of which he had no knowledge.
He alleged that this incident shows that someone else is running the bureaucracy in Jammu and Kashmir.
Omar Abdullah, linking the issue to the status of Jammu and Kashmir as a Union Territory, said that it is unthinkable in a complete state that the Chief Minister would present a resolution and his own bureaucracy would stand against it.
He said that this incident illustrates the limits of the elected government’s powers and the need to restore statehood.
