Jammu and Kashmir: History’s lessons and perils of political management

In October 1983, then Jammu and Kashmir (J&K) Chief Minister Farooq Abdullah hosted a historic Opposition Conclave in Srinagar, bringing together N. T. Rama Rao, Jyoti Basu, Ramakrishna Hegde, Biju Patnaik, Parkash Singh Badal, and several other Opposition leaders. The gathering was an attempt to forge a national Opposition alliance against then Prime Minister Indira Gandhi and to challenge the Centre’s increasingly centralised approach to Centre-State relations.

The organisation of the conclave became a turning point in the widening rift between Indira Gandhi and Farooq Abdullah. In an interview published in this newspaper in 2002, this author asked Dr. Farooq Abdullah about the political fallout of the Srinagar Opposition Conclave. He questioned why the gathering of Opposition leaders in Srinagar had been viewed with such suspicion by the Centre. After all, he argued, bringing together Opposition parties and providing a platform for debate on Centre–State relations was a legitimate democratic exercise. Why should hosting such a gathering be construed as an act of political defiance?