4 min readUpdated: Jul 13, 2026 05:14 PM IST
The BJP on Monday shot a legal notice to J&K Chief Minister Omar Abdullah, demanding that he either provide concrete evidence to substantiate his allegations of “poaching” against the BJP or issue a public apology.
Addressing party workers, the chief minister had said on Saturday that the BJP was attempting to engineer defections within the ruling National Conference and had offered between Rs 20 crore and Rs 30 crore to a Jammu MLA through a lawyer affiliated with the national party.
The BJP has stated that if Abdullah fails to provide evidence to support his allegations or does not apologise, it will initiate a Rs 100 crore defamation suit against him for his remarks.
Terming the allegations baseless, the notice from the state unit chief, Sat Paul Sharma, seeks an apology from the CM within seven days and a “cease and desist” order to prevent repetition of the claims of alleged “poaching”.
On Saturday, Abdullah had lashed out at the BJP government at the Centre, adopting an increasingly confrontational tone. “They are designated to the back seats, and that’s where they will remain,” he had said.
The remarks come ahead of the NC’s statehood protests in Delhi on July 20. The party has invited several national leaders for the statehood protest, including Congress’s Sonia Gandhi and Rahul Gandhi, Samajwadi Party president Akhilesh Yadav, TMC president Mamata Banerjee, Tamil Nadu CM C Joseph Vijay, and others. He has also extended invitations to PDP president Mehbooba Mufti and Mirwaiz Umar Farooq.
On Sunday, Omar addressed party workers in Jammu, stating that the protest at Jantar Mantar to mount pressure on the Centre to restore statehood would mark the beginning of a “new method” since “enough time was given to the Central government to fulfil its promise”.
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“We pursued the restoration of statehood for nearly two years, giving enough time to the central government to fulfil its promise made to the people of Jammu and Kashmir,” Omar told the gathering at Maharaja Hari Singh Park in Jammu city, his first major public meeting in the BJP stronghold. “Now, we will start resorting to ‘a new method’ for it from July 20 onwards when we raise slogans for restoration of statehood at our dharna in Delhi,” he said.
Reacting to the development, Omar Abdullah said Monday, “I have not been issued any summons, I have received an electronic copy of a letter from a lawyer.”
Terming the notice from the BJP an “honour” he said: ”I’m the only politician in J&K who has been bestowed with a love letter like this from the BJP. I consider it a mark of respect that I am obviously a political force that they cannot ignore”.
At the same time, he said that the move is symbolic of the way the BJP fights. “They take political fights and hide behind the courts.” Stating that he could’ve made the same statement in the Assembly and taken advantage of the privilege that he is afforded.
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Omar also stated that for the last few months there have been many slanderous accusations against the NC and its leadership by senior BJP leaders in J&K. “Particularly one leader who has time and again levelled unfounded and slanderous allegations against us, whom we have been fighting politically. Going on from now, we will begin the process to that particular BJP leader and a few others. And let’s see where this process goes.”
Regarding the party’s scheduled protest in New Delhi on July 20, the chief minister said, “we have been told that the police in Delhi are obliged to give permission five days ahead. Usually not less than five days. So sometime by Wednesday morning we should hear from Delhi Police.”
