Sajad Lone’s Jammu and Kashmir People’s Conference (JKPC), Hakim Yasin’s People’s Democratic Front (PDF) and a Jamaat-e-Islami faction Justice and Development Front (JDF) that contested the 2024 J&K Assembly polls, have recently formed an alliance to offer a political “alternative” in the Union Territory. The alliance has been named the People’s Alliance for Change (PAC).
In an interview with The Indian Express, Sajad Lone speaks on a range of issues including the PAC’s roadmap and the performance of the Omar Abdullah-led National Conference (NC) government in J&K. Excerpts:
How has this new alliance been envisioned? What was the idea behind the JKPC, PDF and JDF coming together?
I believe it (the alliance) is the need of the moment. J&K politics has been plagued with a unique type of barrenness for decades. The same set faces in different forms and nomenclatures have ruled (J&K). It is dynastic and oligopolistic. Rulers changed all across the country. But despite three decades of violence, thousands of fatalities, high unemployment rates, the same set of rulers have persisted.
One needs a broader alliance where we can pool our strengths, and truthfully create a feeling of an alternative, viable platform.
And there is a shared past. A past defined by pain. The alliance can identify with the pain (of Kashmiris). Ironically, while almost all Kashmiris can narrate some incidents of pain, the only few who cannot are the ones who have been the rulers in the last three decades. The exigencies of governance were such that during their rule, people died, or were jailed, or tortured. Why are Kashmiris repeatedly electing the same set of people? Either Kashmiris do not know how to vote or the system is preset in such a manner that Kashmiris vote for a preset choice. We have our ideological differences within the alliance, but we have decided to work on the overlaps.
What is the point of convergence then for the alliance?
This alliance works within the Constitution of India, and believes in the concept of India. It is as mainstream as any other party taking part in elections. And there should be no impediments created. The upheaval in the last three decades and the resultant pain is a function of denial of democracy. Let us hope that overtly or covertly the same denial does not prevail now. The pain of the past can be an enabler if it is used for reconciliation. There has to be a process to accept the (pain) and do what it takes to extricate them from the psyche. The belief that pain exists and is not imaginary is a point of convergence (for the alliance).
Are you envisioning the alliance as an opposition to the established political establishment or more as another alternative to the BJP and other national parties?
You have to understand that the system is set in a particular way. The moment someone from the huge army of victims (in J&K) dares to challenge the incumbents, the existing oligarchs forget their internecine wars, get together, and accuse the newcomers of political treason.
Before the BJP came to power, they would accuse them of being agents of the central covert agencies. After the BJP came to power, it is more fashionable to accuse them of being in league with the BJP.
It is a different matter that there is not a single (ruling) party (in J&K) that has not had an alliance with BJP… For example, Mr Omar Abdullah was the junior foreign minister in the NDA regime under Mr (Atal Behari) Vajpayee… At a time when violence was high in Kashmir…
This invariably meant that human right violations were rampant and it was the junior foreign minister Omar Abdullah’s duty to blindly defend every killing in the Valley as genuine and deserving.
(People’s Democratic Party’s) Mehbooba Mufti was the CM in coalition with the BJP. And post (the 2024) elections Omar Abdullah sounds, looks and behaves more like the BJP than even the BJP.
While the so-called secular media in India will grill us, the oligarchs will be let off and barely asked any questions about their dalliances with the BJP. People of Kashmir too have to introspect and decide whose side they are on. Are they going to support those who scripted disasters — from rigging of 1987 elections to presiding over massacres, to blinding people… Or are they going to give dignity a chance and punish those who have punished the Kashmiris?
You have asserted that the new alliance would be primarily electoral. Are you looking to contest the next Assembly polls or will the alliance work sooner than that?
I believe that an alliance should be stitched maybe even a decade in advance. You have national alliances. They do not wait for elections. Why should we wait? Why should it be linked? There are panchayat elections, and there are by-elections. I do not see any reason why we should wait for the next five years. And the group is going to grow. More people may join.
*The Omar Abdullah government has said that J&K cannot function under the dual control of the CM office and the Raj Bhawan. How do you see this row?
I think statehood is a matter of our rights, not charity. We all knew before elections that we are a UT. There are limited powers…
When it comes to weaponising transfers of government employees, denying funds to constituencies of rivals, corruption, this government is second to none. It is only when it comes to delivering that the ruling party in unison complains of being powerless.
The NC has been in power earlier too. And in their earlier tenures when we had full statehood and Article 370, they did not deliver then… Why do you expect them to deliver now?
The NC had promised the moon to the electorate… They promised free electricity for up to 200 units… 12 gas cylinders per year, regularising 61,000 daily wagers… creating 1,00,000 new jobs. I have calculated that their promises would cost the exchequer Rs 12,000 crore per year. Where will they get it from?
While I bat for statehood and believe it is humiliating to live as a UT, absence of statehood should not be used as an excuse by the NC to renege on the promises made during elections.
But an Omar Abdullah who leaves no chance in singing hymns in praise of Modi ji, and bends over backwards trying to please them, should be the last person to talk about dual control. The Assembly is the constitutional institution to raise such issues. In the Assembly, he has been praising Modi ji. Outside the Assembly, he talks about dual control and that too obliquely. He is not willing to confront the BJP. We have so many Opposition Chief Ministers in the country. How many of them are chasing BJP leaders with expensive Kashmiri shawls?
I believe, today, retrospectively, that Omar Abdullah should not have become the Chief Minister. As a mark of protest. This is totally a personal observation. It’s not a political observation. It is humiliating to see him taking the knee at any given opportunity.
What is your take on the functioning of the elected government so far?
What government? It is a big mess. Governance seems to be on a pause mode. We are into the tenth month of government. The Cabinet is yet to be expanded. There are only four ministers. Mr Omar Abdullah apparently has 32 big and small departments. How can he run so many departments? He is never in his office. J&K is administratively destined for disaster.
*A subject that has been most debated since the NC came to power is the rationalisation of reservations. You have stated your position on the subject but what, to your mind, is a clear, workable solution on this issue?
Reservation is a tool used to disempower the Kashmiri-speaking ethnic group. Time has come to call a spade a spade. It is advantageous to Jammu and disadvantageous to Kashmir. The recruitment lists released in the last few years follow a trend. The Kashmiris who make up about 65% of the population have been relegated to 20% in the recruitment lists. And this started in Congress time between 2002 to 2008. And has been carried on by the BJP. This is the typical national interest consensus. No national party or leader talks about it. The recurring national interest unanimous theme is that Kashmiris need to be taught a lesson. I have presented data in the Assembly which proves that approximately 80% of Jammu population is in the reserved category. They have crossed the line in reservations and they are in the process of signing a post dated cheque for disaster.
Sajad Lone’s Jammu and Kashmir People’s Conference (JKPC) recently announced an alliance in J&K. (Facebook/Sajad Lone) 
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