Srinagar: A month after Prime Minister Narendra Modi's outreach to mainstream leaders of Jammu and Kashmir, National Conference president Farooq Abdullah said on Sunday that there has been "no follow-up results" on the ground.
Adbullah said this in reference to the prime minister's remarks at the June 24 meeting in New Delhi that he wanted to win the hearts of the people of Jammu and Kashmir and remove "Dillikidoori" (the distance from Delhi) and "dilkidoori" (distance between hearts).
"That was a welcome statement but there is no effort on the ground to win the hearts of the people. People continue to be locked up and dissent is not tolerated. We want to see the change on the ground, a visible effort to win back the people who went through the trauma of their state being dismembered, its special status removed in one sudden blow," the three-time former Chief Minister told.
"...we are yet to see any follow-up results even after a month," he said.
"Trust is something that has been missing from both sides (Delhi and Srinagar). Successive prime ministers -- Jawaharlal Nehru, Narasimha Rao, Atal Bihari Vajpayee -- made promises but the trust deficit has persisted," he added.
The 83-year-old veteran politician said that he and his party had attended the Delhi meeting because it was an invitation from the prime minister although he had no expectations from it. Yet, he had hoped for steps to win the hearts and minds of people but nothing had happened.
Abdullah insisted that restoration of "full, undiluted" statehood to Jammu and Kashmir should precede the elections to its Assembly. All major parties have demanded that and the Centre should prove its bona fide by agreeing to that.
Asked if his party would take part in the elections if the statehood was not granted before that, the NC president said, "We will decide at that time when the bugle is blown. We will then sit down and decide what we should do."
In reply to a question about the fate of the People's Alliance for Gupkar Declaration (PAGD), a conglomerate of six mainstream political parties including the NC and its arch rival PDP, Abdullah said the alliance stands and "we are together...we all are there. We haven't left."