BUKHARI BEGINS?

With three former Chief Ministers’ still incarcerated, businessman politician Syed Altaf Bukhari regrouped a section of the political class to defreeze the politics in Kashmir’s winter chill. Saima Bhat met the new characters to explore the possibility of a new politics dawning upon Kashmir, that ceased to be special as well as a state

-  Saima Bhat

As Iltija Mufti, was struggling to get out of her house to pay homage at Mufti Muhammad Sayeed’s grave in Bijbehara on January 7, at least eight of her grandfather’s erstwhile aides were checking their creases one last time before meeting GC Murmu, the founding Lieutenant Governor of the UT of Jammu and Kashmir.

It is too early to say that Mufti’s fourth death anniversary marked the informal foundation of a new political force on the wreckage of PDP. But the fact remains that Mufti’s erstwhile urban face, Syed Altaf Bukhari chose this day to lead a group of politicians, mostly from the PDP, for the first time to have a discussion with Murmu. They presented a memorandum seeking the return of statehood, protection to people’s land ownership and jobs. The meeting marked the first major political activity after the special status of Jammu and Kashmir was binned on August 5.

The eight former lawmakers Zaffar Iqbal Manhas, Javaid Hassan Beigh, Noor Mohammad Sheikh, Choudhary Qamar Hussain, Raja Manzoor Ahmad, Mohammad Dilawar Mir led by Bukhari (all from PDP) and Ghulam Hassan Mir (one of PDP founders who later quit the party to have his own) are being seen as the launch of a third front, which is willing to do business with Delhi without asking for the restoration of the special status.

The group presented a 15-point memorandum to Murmu, which, inter alia, demanded the release of all prisoners detained after the removal of Article 370 and splitting of Jammu and Kashmir into two Union Territories. Apart from withdrawal of cases against the youth, restoring functional autonomy to the JK Bank, reviving various economic sectors, restoration of internet and some policy mechanism to address the unemployment, the group sought protection to peoples’ right to land and jobs.