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Sharma meets Omar, discuss issues except autonomy

KT NEWS SERVICE. Dated: 11/9/2017 11:13:11 AM

‘Waiting in guest house for people will not work’

SRINAGAR, Nov 8: The centre’s special representative for Kashmir, Dineshwar Sharma, today called on former chief minister Omar Abdullah at his residence here.
They discussed various issues but not autonomy, being strongly advocated by Omar’s National Conference (NC).
Briefing media persons, Omar said, “Sharma came to meet me. He told me about the task he has been assigned. He sought my views on how he would carry on his task in the right way and how he could make his mission more successful.”
However, the former chief minister refused to divulge the details about the suggestions he gave to Sharma to make his mission successful. “Whatever I told him is between us and I hope he would implement the suggestions that I put forward before him,” he added.
The National Conference (NC) working president said that if one would continue waiting in guest house for people then this process will not work. “I hope to see more activities in his efforts next time when he would arrive again because all of us want this issue be resolved through dialogue and people here spend their lives in peace and calm environment,” Omar said.
To a question that NC president Dr Farooq Abdullah has described Sharma’s talks as a futile exercise former chief minister said, “The NC president did not say anything wrong. The centre itself dampened our expectations and prime minister himself made a statement saying talking about internal autonomy is akin to talking about Azadi. So for people like us who talk about internal autonomy it is obvious that it was like sprinkling water on our hopes.”
He said now how much centre’s cooperation is with Sharma would come to be known by his activities. As of now I would only say that whatever Dr Abdullah said was not wrong.
Regarding raising of autonomy during the talks, the former chief minister said, “See, I spoke to Sharma alone. My party so far has not received any formal invitation for talks. If any delegation from National Conference talks to Sharma next time then that time we will talk about internal autonomy and NC’s political agenda. As of now, I did not say anything like that.”
Asked why there was cold response to interlocutor, Omar said, “The misunderstandings that were created by the Centre about Sharma’s mission and that his status was undermined particularly from PMO office, Home Ministry would be rectified and the roadblocks that were created by the Centre in the mission of Sharma would be cleared. If that happens – I think this time less people met him – I hope next time more people would be ready to meet him”
However, he maintained that the responsibility lies on Government of India. Till now, the centre instead of making task of its representative easy has made it difficult.
In reply to another question, Omar said “As of now, no reservations have been cleared. We are looking towards centre that they make such a forward movement which clear these reservations. They should understand that the way people should have met Sharma did not happen. To make the mission of Sharma more successful, the Centre has to think about that.”