Excelsior Correspondent
JAMMU, Dec 24: Governor N N Vohra today accepted the resignation of Omar Abdullah from the Chief Minister’s post, but asked him to continue till alternative arrangements are made.
Omar, called on Vohra today and submitted his resignation as Chief Minister, official sources said.
They added that the Governor has accepted Abdullah’s resignation and requested him to continue in office till alternative arrangements are made.
Omar had taken over as the Chief Minister of Jammu and Kashmir on January 5, 2009 to head the NC-Congress coalition and completed full term of six years. However, his party faced severe drubbing in the Assembly elections and was relegated to third position with 15 seats as against 28 in the outgoing Assembly.
With resignation of the Chief Minister, entire Council of Ministry deemed to have resigned.
The political parties have time till January 17 for formation of new Government for which back channel diplomacy has already started since the Assembly results threw a hung verdict with no party reaching even close to half way mark of 44 in the House of 87.
PDP has emerged single largest party with 28 seats followed by BJP (25), NC (15), Congress (12), People’s Conference (2), CPM (1), Independents and Others 4.
Speaking to reporters after tendering his resignation to the Governor, Omar indicated that his National Conference could play a part in Government formation as the elections have given a fractured verdict in the State.
At the same time, the NC working president said the onus of Government formation lies primarily on BJP and PDP and his party will adopt a wait and watch approach. The PDP and BJP have emerged two single largest parties with 28 and 25 seats in the hung 12th Legislative Assembly.
Recalling that in 2002 NC with 28 MLAs had opted from first day to stay out of the Government formation and “it became very easy for Mufti Sayeed (PDP patron) with 16 MLAs to form the Government”, he said: “today I am not in any mood to make it easy for other parties to form a Government. Let us see what happens.”
“It is the duty of PDP and BJP to form the Government. Let us see what they will do,” he said, adding that the NC has had no discussions with anybody on Government formation.
“There is no reason for us to keep anyone in or out of power. As I have been saying since yesterday it is not the duty of National Conference to form the Government nor it is duty of NC to help anyone form the Government,” Omar said.
He dropped similar hints with his tweets when he said: “incidentally in 2002, Mufti (Mohammad Sayeed) became Chief Minister with 16 MLAs and NC with 28 (MLAs) sat in opposition. So excuse me if I don’t oblige by rolling over to play dead.”
Omar also took a dig at PDP saying while his party was pleased with its performance, PDP which has more seats must be feeling defeated as its result did not match the “hype”.
“NC has 15+2 (independents) and we are very pleased, PDP has 28 and Mufti Sb (sahib) hasn’t been seen, much less heard. Clearly the more you have the more you want,” Omar wrote on micro-blogging site Twitter.
“Expectations were hyped and twisted to such an extent that now 17 feels like a victory and 28 a defeat. Go figure!” he added.
As term of present 11th Assembly expires on January 17, 2015, the new Government had to be in place before that otherwise the Governor’s rule becomes imminent.
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