After many many years, National Conference has a working president. This working president is Chief Minister Omar Abdullah. It is something rare in the National Conference that the Chief Minister  has become the “working president” of the party.   In this party which has ruled the state of Jammu and Kashmir for most of the years since independence, the Chief Minister  and President  of National Conference are  inseparable identities. It was true of Sheikh Muhammad Abdullah, at least since 1975, when he took over as Chief Minister after the Sheikh- Indira accord  and when he revived the National Conference.  It  was also a fact of life as long as Sheikh Abdullah’s eldest son  Farooq Abdullah was the Chief Minister, and when he stepped down in June 2002, he handed over the party president’s post to Omar, hoping that  the son would rise and become Chief  Minister. The politics of the times and the 2002 election results upset the calculations, no one from the Abdullah clan became a member of the elected legislative Assembly. For next  six years, Omar was President and his father as patron of the party. And when the National Conference-Congress coalition government came to power, Farooq Abdullah took over reins of the party, relieving Omar of his party responsibilities. There is more of politics than history in the whole sequence of events that followed  after Omar became Chief Minister  in January 2009.
At the moment, the party was feeling neglected. There were insiders in the party- some close to Omar, others  to  Farooq Abdullah, the party was  not landing anywhere. There were off and on  efforts by Farooq Abdullah to connect with the party cadres. He would meet them at public meetings and  visit their homes. But there was a lack of consistency, despite his best efforts. Farooq could not be present all the time at all the places, as a union minister he had his responsibilities of the ministry at the Centre, and apart from that his health was also not  allowing him to take that much of strain . There was a pressure on him from all the sides. In the  process, a fear was growing within the party cadres as to what would happen to the Grand Old Party  of Kashmir.  Some of the party leaders, in  private and public, were giving vent to their frustration. Some were frustrated for they did not see any hope of them finding a place  in the ministry, others were  genuine in their criticism. While National Conference was making on and off attempts to revive  itself centered around Farooq Abdullah, the  bete noire of the  Abdullah family, the main Opposition Peoples Democratic  Party,  had become hyper-active, reaching out to the people and making the National Conference leadership- Omar Abdullah and his ministers to react. National Conference was digging up old issues,  peppered with   twists to  the days of Mufti Muhammad Sayeed  as Home Minister of the country. That is how the political  matters were being handled – the most interesting factor was that sometimes they were interchanging their role. National Conference owning some themes, PDP making counter claims. For example, who  started work on  the Mughal Road  or  who built power projects or who did  not, whether the panchayats were empowered  or not.
Against this backdrop, Omar Abdullah became  “ working president”. This can be easily decoded  that Omar is “ President” of the party, the “ working” is  a prefix to retain the stature of Farooq Abdullah as president. That was a political necessity , so that the young and the old  find themselves on the same  wave length. Whether this experiment will succed or not, the answer lies with the time. The initial enthusiasm that Omar has  shown through his visits to the two border districts of Rajouri and Poonch in Jammu region, has given some hope to the party cadres, but the moot question remains, can Omar sustain the  enthusiasm and  bring the party to the level  of grand old days. Much has changed and then he has a responsibility toward  the office and promise of  Chief Minister. If he does so, history would judge him differently  than he has been assessed so far. Omar  has  to  live upto expectations. The PDP bashing is okay, but   more important is to  create  place for National Conference in the hearts and minds of the people – a term that  has different connotation in political lexicon than that of the armed forces  who invented this catch phrase.

Lastupdate on : Mon, 30 Apr 2012 21:30:00 Makkah time
Lastupdate on : Mon, 30 Apr 2012 18:30:00 GMT
Lastupdate on : Tue, 1 May 2012 00:00:00 IST