Former officials urge India’s chief justice to act on Kashmir’s statehood
Former top officials call on Supreme Court to act on Jammu and Kashmir’s status, citing broken promises and democratic risks
NEW DELHI, India (MNTV) — A group of retired senior officials and civil society members have written an open letter to the Chief Justice of India, B.R. Gavai, raising urgent concerns over the continued denial of statehood to Jammu and Kashmir — six years after the region’s constitutional autonomy was dismantled by the Narendra Modi-led Indian government.
The five petitioners include former Union Home Secretary Gopal Pillai, retired Major-General Ashok K. Mehta, former Air Vice-Marshal Kapil Kak, former Kashmir interlocutor Radha Kumar, and former Inter-State Council Secretary Amitabha Pande.
According to the letter, the Indian Supreme Court’s own judgment acknowledged that it was “not ruling on the constitutionality or unconstitutionality of demoting an existing state in its entirety to two Union Territories, because the Solicitor-General had assured it that statehood would be restored at an appropriate time.”
Referring to those assurances — made both in Parliament and before the court — the petitioners wrote: “The Union administration’s repeated assurances that statehood will be restored, both in parliament and through the Solicitor-General eighteen months ago, suggest a tacit recognition that the removal of statehood is unconstitutional.”
They also criticized the solicitor general’s argument before the court in December 2023, when he said statehood would be restored “in stages.” The group contended that such a phased approach “nullifies the constitutional issue that no state can be demoted to a union territory in its entirety,” and warned that the precedent puts all Indian states at risk of similar erosion of their constitutional status.
The petition addresses what they expect may be the government’s current justification — a deadly militant attack in the Pahalgam region — and argues the opposite: “The high turnout in the October 2024 assembly elections with no violence, and the absolute majority electors gave the National Conference, a regional party, indicated the people had voted for an elected administration with the strength to govern according to public aspirations,” they wrote, adding that locals were the first to condemn the attack.
“The most effective bulwark against such vitiation is restoration of civil and political rights, including oversight institutions, that will come with statehood,” the letter continued.
The group has now formally requested the Chief Justice to constitute a Supreme Court bench to hear pending constitutional petitions challenging the revocation of Jammu and Kashmir’s statehood. They are also seeking a firm deadline for its restoration — and legal safeguards to prevent any future government from unilaterally stripping states of their constitutional status.
Their appeal comes amid growing concerns that Jammu and Kashmir’s political rights have been indefinitely suspended, despite earlier claims by India’s central government that the move was temporary and intended to restore normalcy.
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