Srinagar: Jammu and Kashmir ruling party National Conference's MP from Srinagar, Aga Ruhullah Mehdi, said that no allegation or case will silence him until Article 370 is restored. This comes a day after the Anti-Corruption Bureau (ACB) filed a chargesheet against him and his five close relatives for land compensation fraud.
Ruhullah, who has been vocal after the abrogation of Article 370 on August 5, 2019, said the chargesheet filed against him and his relatives is a “childish attempt” to silence him about speaking for the restoration of Article 370, about the minorities and Muslim rights and issues like the Waqf Act.
Ruhullah addressed a press conference at his residence in Budgam, where he said the allegations and “unsubstantiated” chargesheet are a “deliberate effort to intimidate him by the government by “misusing agencies like the ACB. “I will not be silenced or intimidated. I will fall silent on the day when Article 370 is restored, atrocities against Muslims and minorities are stopped, and constitutional rights of J&K are reinstated,” he said.
The Jammu and Kashmir ACB filed a charge sheet against Ruhullah, his five close paternal uncles and cousins, and 16 other retired government employees and landowners of Budgam and Bemina, accusing them of committing fraud in land compensation of Rs 38.20 lakhs and tampering with revenue records.
The government rehabilitated Srinagar's Dal Lake dwellers in 2010 at Rakh-e-Aerth in the Budgam district, and the land possession by the Aga family was taken by the government instead of compensation. ACB, in its statement, said the Agas showed land above what was taken to get more for compensation.
Reacting to these allegations in the chargesheet, Ruhullah said his grandfather, Aga Syed Mustafa, possessed 90 kanals of land at Rakh-e-Aerth, which was taken by the government for the rehabilitation of Dal Lake dwellers.
“The government should have paid us Rs 40,000 per kanal as compensation as per the rates. But we got less than that. I, as a sharer of the land, got Rs 80,000 from my uncle, as he is the custodian of our ancestral property after my grandfather’s demise. So how come I figure in the chargesheet?” he said.
Questioning the probe and chargesheet by ACB, Ruhullah said that in these 20 years, the anti-graft body has not even once approached him about these allegations.
He said that he wouldn't stop his struggle and speak democratically for the rights of the people of Jammu and Kashmir and Muslims in India, as his “religious teaching inspires him to sacrifice, struggle and endure pain”.
On No Waqf resolution by NC
Ruhullah flayed his party for not bringing a resolution in the Jammu and Kashmir assembly about the Waqf (Amendment) Act, which was passed in the Parliament.
The assembly speaker, Abdul Rahim Rather, who is a veteran NC leader and legislator from a Budgam constituency, did not allow the resolution or discussion in the recently held assembly session, citing that the act was sub judice as the Tamil Nadu government had challenged it in the Supreme Court.
Ruhullah said that the assembly could have discussed the act and passed a resolution over it, which means just expressing their opinion, even if it was sub judice. “A resolution is not lawmaking; it's just an opinion.”
On the restoration of statehood, he said, “Statehood won’t be handed back easily. We should not have waited passively. We should have mobilised politically — 50 MLAs should have camped outside the residences of the Prime Minister and the Home Minister. We are running away from the people’s sentiments.”
Assembly by-polls for Budgam
Speaking about the assembly by-elections for Budgam, which was vacated by Chief Minister Omar Abdullah, Ruhullah said that people of the Budgam constituency demand that “someone from Budgam contest the election and represent them.”
Ruhullah has won the Budgam seat thrice since the 2002 assembly elections, and this seat was won by NC Vice President and CM Omar in the 2024 assembly polls. Omar had also won the Ganderbal seat; he vacated Budgam to retain Ganderbal.
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