Demands for restoration of Jammu and Kashmir’s statehood cannot ignore the Pahalgam terror attack and its regional security implications, the Supreme Court said on Thursday.
A bench led by Chief Justice BR Gavai was responding to a petition seeking implementation of the Supreme Court’s December 2023 order, which had stated that J&K’s statehood should be restored at the earliest opportunity after the conduct of an Assembly election.
The petition calls for the return of J&K’s statehood within two months, terming the delay in following the court order a “violation of India’s federal structure…”
Government Position and Political Reactions
Jammu and Kashmir was bifurcated into the union territories of Jammu and Kashmir, and Ladakh, in August 2019, after the government scrapped Article 370 that had given it special status.
Since then, the government has said statehood will be restored “at an appropriate time” but has not announced a timeline. In 2023, the Election Commission was directed to hold an Assembly election — the first since 2014 — with J&K under President’s Rule since.
Recently, Chief Minister Omar Abdullah wrote to leaders of all political parties urging them to introduce a bill in Parliament to restore J&K’s statehood. He stressed that restoration was not a favour but a necessary correction.
“The restoration must not be viewed as a concession, but as an essential course correction—one that prevents us from sliding down a dangerous and slippery slope where the statehood of our constituent States is no longer regarded as a foundational and sacred constitutional right but reduced instead to a discretionary favour bestowed at the will of the Central Government,” Abdullah wrote.
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He further warned that the precedent of downgrading a state into a Union Territory would have unsettling consequences for the country and should be a red line never crossed.
