Jahangeer Ganaie
Pulwama, Sep 6: Former chief minister of J&K and National Conference vice president Omar Abdullah on Wednesday said if the Modi government wants to change the country’s name to Bharat because of the INDIA bloc, the opposition would look for some other name.
Talking to reporters on the sidelines of a condolence meet at Banderpora in south Kashmir’s Pulwama district, Omar, said, “Both Bharat and India have been mentioned in our Constitution and we use both of them. If PM doesn’t want to mention INDIA, let him not do it, but he shouldn’t deviate from the Constitution of India.”
If you want to remove this name, you have to remove it at thousands of places; then you have to rename State Bank of India, ISRO, IIM, IIT, AIIMS and whatnot, the NC leader said, adding, “If this is being done only because of opposition parties, then we are ready to change the name of the alliance but don’t want to put country in any kind of risk or disaster as we haven’t come to increase expenses but to decrease it.”
He said there is no agenda of ‘One Nation One Election’ as several committees were formed in the past. Now, one more committee has been constituted and we don’t know the motive behind it, he said.
“If the aim is that the process should become easy, then there shouldn’t be any objection, but if it is aimed to weaken or perish regional parties, then we are against it,” Omar said. “If the federal structure of the country will be weakened, we are against it. Some even say that it will start from ‘One Nation One Election’ and will lead to ‘one nation, no election’, then nobody will be in favour of it,” he added.
There is a need for growth and development but there is very little impact of it on the ground as the unemployment rate is increasing, he said.
The former CM also said that the Ladakh administration had wasted the time of the high court and Supreme Court and tried to snatch NC’s symbol.
“In the court of Allah, justice ultimately prevails,” Abdullah said, adding, “Though it took time, we got our symbol back and we are happy over it.”
