After her remarks on the tricolour, against which a case has been filed, Mehbooba Mufti has spoken about a bridge of peace between India and her neighbours.

Last year on August 5, the special state status of Jammu & Kashmir was rendered null and void by reorganizing the state into two union territories- J&K and Ladakh. After that the parties of the erstwhile state have come on a single platform (Gupkar alliance) to protest against this decision of the GOI.

Mehbooba Mufti along with other political leaders was taken into custody on August 5, 2019 when the centre repealed Article 370 that granted J&K autonomy under India’s constitution. Mehbooba apart from being kept incarcerated in detention for over a year was also slapped with the PSA.

After her release from the detention, she had made a controversial remark. In her 83 seconds audio speech to her followers, the PDP leader had vowed to continue her “struggle for the restoration of Article 370’’ and the resolution of the Kashmir issue.  Again last Friday she had said that she was not interested in contesting elections or holding the Tricolour till the constitutional changes enforced on 5 August 2019, were rolled back. She had also stated that she would hold the Tricolour only when the separate flag of the erstwhile state of Jammu and Kashmir was restored.

Some of the senior leaders in PDP like TS Bajwa, Hassan Ali Waffa and Bed Mahajan were unhappy with Mehbooba’s statement on Tricolour, so they had resigned from the PDP.

BJP leaders had hit out at Mehbooba for her remarks, saying seditious statements will not be tolerated and had demanded her arrest on the same day. Jammu and Kashmir BJP president Ravinder Raina had told the reporters, “I request Lieutenant Governor Manoj Sinha to take cognizance of the seditious remarks of Mehbooba Mufti, book her for the seditious act and put her behind bars”. Raina had further added, “We will sacrifice every drop of our blood for our flag, country and motherland. J-K is an integral part of our country, so only one flag can be hoisted in J-K and that is the national flag”. He had also said in the usual BJP way of attacking other parties, that if Kashmiri leaders are feeling insecure in India, they can go to Pakistan and China.

Referring to the Centre’s move to abrogate Article 370 on August 5 last year, Raina had said that no decision taken by the central government can be reversed. A person from Jaunpur in UP, Himanshu Srivastava had filed a case through an advocate named Upendra Vikram Singh, stating that Mufti should apologize for her statement on tricolour. The court has accepted his application and has fixed November 27 as the next date of hearing.

After the episode on the seditious remarks on the flag, Mehbooba Mufti recently stated that her party PDP wants J&K to be the bridge of peace between India, Pakistan and China.

The author is a student member of Amity Centre of Happiness.