Had I asked Centre, would have had to install Lone govt, says Malik; PDP, NC laud J&K governor

Leaving aside the fax machine fiasco , good to see that governor Sb refused to take dictation from Delhi , rather opted for dissolution of assembly. This could be unprecedented, given the story of democracy in the state.

— Mehbooba Mufti (@MehboobaMufti) November 27, 2018

Moments after Mufti staked claim to form the government with the support of the National Conference and Congress last Wednesday, People’s Conference chief Sajad Lone also submitted his bid, claiming support of the BJP and 18 MLAs from other parties. However, Malik soon issued an order dissolving the state assembly, paving the way for fresh elections.

[ie_backquote quote=”If I looked at Delhi, I would have had to make Lone’s Sarkar. I would have gone down in history as a corrupt man” cite=”Satya Pal Malik”]

Malik said at an event in Madhya Pradesh’s Gwalior that he chose to dissolve the J&K Assembly instead of obliging either side as he didn’t want to go down in history as a “dishonest” man.

“If I looked at Delhi, I would have had to make Lone’s Sarkar. I would have gone down in history as a corrupt man. I ended the whole issue. Whoever has to abuse will do so, but I am convinced that I did the right thing,” he said during a pre-convocation academic conclave of ITM University in Gwalior on Saturday.

My compliments to Governor Malik for not looking to Delhi & for not taking their instructions thereby stopping the installation of a government of the BJP & it’s proxies formed by horse trading, defections & use of money.

— Omar Abdullah (@OmarAbdullah) November 27, 2018

Malik’s remarks counter the perception that he acted at the behest of the Modi government. Former chief minister Abdullah too weighed in, lauding the governor for thwarting the installation of a BJP government formed by “horse trading, defections and use of money”.

“My compliments to Governor Malik for not looking to Delhi & for not taking their instructions thereby stopping the installation of a government of the BJP and its proxies formed by horse trading, defections and use of money,” Abdullah tweeted.

At the event, Malik also said if NC-PDP were so keen on forming the government, they should have come to Jammu a day earlier and not send their letter through Twitter. “It was an Eid holiday. Did they expect the governor to stand by the fax machine and wait for their fax. If Mufti and Abdullah were serious about forming a government, they should have rung me up, or sent me a letter,” he said.

Malik said that as per the state Constitution he did not have to take permission from the president or Parliament. On charges by the BJP that the NC and the PDP joined hands on the direction of Pakistan (a charge later retracted by Ram Madhav), Malik said he cannot blame Farooq Abdullah and Omar Abdullah because they were children of Sheikh Abdullah, who “chose India” and were nationalists.

“Mufti Sayeed was Indian and nobody can suspect his nationalism and no one suspects his daughter’s credentials as a nationalist,” he added.

Later in the day, a Raj Bhavan spokesperson in Jammu clarified that the governor while taking the decision to dissolve the Assembly acted in an “objective and impartial” manner. “There was no pressure or any kind of intervention from the Centre in the entire matter,” he said in a press statement.

After dissolving the J&K Assembly last week, which saw much drama in the lead up to the climax, Malik defended his decision, citing the “impossibility of forming a stable government by the coming together of political parties with opposing political ideologies”. “The coming together of such parties in a grouping is nothing but an attempt to gain power rather than to form a responsive government,” he had said.