Opposition parties plan to corner J&K Govt in autumn Assembly session from Sept 21

The 10-day Autumn Session of the Jammu and Kashmir Legislative Assembly, beginning here on September 21, is expected to be stormy as opposition parties plan to corner the Omar Abdullah government over issues like job outsourcing, rising unemployment, and the ruling party’s failure to fulfil electoral promises.

The BJP, the main opposition party in the J&K Legislative Assembly, said the Chief Minister Omar Abdullah-led National Conference government has failed on all fronts.

“We will raise the issues about the public in the Assembly. There is an outsourcing scam, corruption is continuing unabated, and the Panchayat and Urban Local Bodies’ polls are being delayed unnecessarily,” BJP spokesperson Altaf Thakur said.

Thakur said his party MLAs will remind the government of its unfulfilled promises made during the 2024 assembly elections. “People were promised 200 units of free electricity. Development works have come to a standstill after the elections,” Thakur said.

PDP MLA from Pulwama Waheed Para said his party will focus on unemployment, outsourcing, the lopsided reservation policy, and regularising daily wagers in government service. “The Session’s duration is short, and we will try to raise the maximum number of public issues, especially the electoral promises made by the National Conference on both the governance and political fronts,” Para said.

National Conference spokesperson Imran Nabi Dar said his party will present its progress report to the people. “The issues of the people are of paramount importance to us. The government is doing its best to fulfil its electoral promises. We do not claim that we have done everything, but we certainly are on the way to fulfil them,” Dar said.

“Parliamentary democracy envisages that the opposition asks questions about public issues and the government is answerable. We will do our part with sincerity,” he said. According to the provisional calendar issued by Speaker of the Legislative Assembly Abdul Rahim Rather, the Session will begin with obituary references on September 21, followed by government business the next day.

The House will discuss private members’ bills on September 24, followed by private members’ resolutions the next day. On September 28, the House will again discuss private members’ bills, followed by government business on September 29 and 30.