Rift Widens in National Conference: MP Aga Ruhullah Mehdi Demands Accountability on Article 370 Before Stepping Down from Lok Sabha
SRINAGAR: In a major political tremor within Jammu and Kashmir’s ruling party, National Conference (NC) Lok Sabha MP Aga Syed Ruhullah Mehdi stated on Friday that he will resign his parliamentary seat, but only after party high command answers critical questions regarding its perceived retreat from its core stance on Article 370.
Mehdi’s stern reaction arrived through a sharply worded two-page letter addressed to NC President Dr. Farooq Abdullah, who had publicly demanded the Srinagar MP seek a fresh mandate after Mehdi voiced dissent against the party’s revised political roadmap.
Reports indicate that the Shia leader is likely to formally submit his resignation on November 3—a date of immense personal significance marking the death anniversary of his father, Aga Syed Mehdi, who was assassinated in a terrorist-triggered IED blast on November 3, 2000.
Key Challenges Raised by Mehdi to NC Leadership:
- Retreat to Mere Statehood: Mehdi argued that reducing political demands to statehood amounts to surrendering constitutional safeguards for land, culture, and environmental protection, effectively legitimizing the unilateral decisions of August 5, 2019.
- 2024 Manifesto Accountability: He questioned why the party fought and won the 2024 Assembly elections pledging the restoration of Articles 370 and 35A if the leadership intended to abandon those promises post-election under the pretext of the BJP being in power.
- Moral Obligation to the Electorate: Mehdi stated that backtracking on explicit poll promises is not merely a miscalculation, but a “brazen moral failure” toward voters who placed their trust in the party.
Drawing attention to Abdullah’s recent remarks urging Kashmiris to avoid economic “supplication” before New Delhi, Mehdi noted that while the sentiment of self-reliance resonated with him, the leadership contradicted itself by diluting its constitutional assertions.
Mehdi raised alarm over the socio-economic challenges confronting Jammu and Kashmir, noting that nearly 65 percent of the population comprises youth facing severe unemployment, resource alienation, cultural erosion, and ecological strain caused by unbridled mining, deforestation, and construction in fragile zones.
Concluding his letter, Mehdi invoked the year 2000, recalling that under Farooq Abdullah’s chief ministership, the J&K Assembly had historically passed the Autonomy Resolution. He questioned why advocating for the region’s core constitutional identity has suddenly become intolerable within the NC framework, stating that the public deserves to know what the party truly stands for.
