Despite heavy snowfall in Srinagar, the rally to mark the culmination of Bharat Jodo Yatra went ahead, with Congress leader Rahul Gandhi and other prominent leaders of opposition parties addressing the march.
As suspense over government formation in Jammu and Kashmir continued, Peoples Democratic Party on Monday said the idea of a grand alliance with the National Conference and Congress was an option for forming a stable government in the state.
The delegation is expected to meet a cross section of people, individuals and organisations in its efforts to bring peace in the Valley.
Top leaders of the Opposition's Indian National Developmental Inclusive Alliance (INDIA) held talks in an informal setting in Mumbai on Thursday evening to chart out a concrete roadmap and evolve a structure for cooperation among the alliance partners to take on the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) in the 2024 Lok Sabha polls.
In a significant political development, National Conference president Farooq Abdullah announced on Thursday that an alliance with the Congress was finalised for all 90 assembly seats in Jammu and Kashmir, which is going for its maiden assembly polls after being reorganised into a Union Territory.
Mehbooba met the prime minister amid reports that she was seeking help against attempts to alter constitutional provisions that give Jammu and Kashmir its special status.
Saddam, a businessman, is the eldest among the two siblings. He has studied in England. Sofiya Nabi Azad, his sister, has studied journalism.
The leaders are Ishfaq Jabbar and Ghulam Nabi Bhat (NC) and Bashir Mir Zahoor Mir and Yasir Reshi (PDP) and one Independent ex-MLA.
BJP's stated position is that Article 370 should be scrapped for total integration of J&K with India.
People's Democratic Party chief Mehbooba Mufti on Monday hit back at Home Minister P Chidambaram, who had warned the party of stern action over its controversial propaganda map.
Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz chief Nawaz Sharif is keen to visit Jammu and Kashmir to trace his ancestral roots, the former Pakistani premier told visiting People's Democratic Party president Mehbooba Mufti. Mufti, who travelled to Islamabad last week to participate in a conference, had met Sharif in Lahore on Thursday.
The encounter took place when the troops of Rashtriya Rifles and Special Operations Group of J&K Police launched a joint cordon and search operation at Dhari Gote Urarbagi in Desa forest belt, some 55 km from Doda town, late Monday evening, the officials said.
Taking a 30-minute break from the Kanyakumari to Kashmir foot march at Sonawar, Gandhi drove to the Pradesh Congress Committee headquarters on Maulana Azad Road before heading to the clock tower, locally known as 'Ghanta Ghar', to unfurl the tricolour.
With a significant number of Opposition leaders present at the swearing-in ceremony of the Congress government in Karnataka, Rajya Sabha MP Kapil Sibal on Sunday said Opposition unity requires much more than optics of this nature and stressed the need for meeting of minds, a common agenda and sacrificing partisan interests.
She said Modi has the mandate to take bold decisions on the lines of Atal Bihari Vajpayee for the resolution of the problems in and around Jammu and Kashmir.
National Conference vice president Omar Abdullah said notifying the rules for the CAA days before the announcement of the Lok Sabha elections shows the Bharatiya Janata Party is not confident about winning 400 seats in the ensuing polls.
Opposition Peoples Democratic Partyon attacked the Omar Abdullah government for the incident of firing by security forces in Baramulla in which one youth was killed, and staged walkout from Jammu and Kashmir Assembly.
The row broke out after a private television news agency attributed the excerpts of the article shared by the NC leader to him.
'If, as happened in Baramulla during the 2024 Lok Sabha election, the youth in the Valley get triggered enough to jump into the wider fray, the end result would be difficult to predict, especially as the state's post-August 5, 2019 political format remains substantially fragmented and foggy,' points out Mohammad Sayeed Malik, the veteran commentator on Kashmir affairs.
Although the Supreme Court has mandated the Centre to conduct the polls by the end of September, a spate of terrorist attacks in J&K could cause delays.
"It is now for the Congress to decide on the alliance. It has to see with which party it could consolidate the gains made in the state over the past five and half years since the 2002 elections," party chief Mehbooba Mufti told PTI.
'As PDP chief, Mehbooba has every right to raise issues in her party's interest.'
The Bharatiya Janata Party on Tuesday clinched a stunning hat-trick win in Haryana overcoming anti-incumbency and dashing Congress' hopes of a comeback while the National Conference-Congress combine pulled off a spectacular victory in maiden elections in Jammu and Kashmir after abrogation of Article 370 in 2019.
She also voiced hope that the Centre will initiate an inclusive engagement through an institutionalised mechanism to address the Kashmir issue and the separatists will respond positively to it.
A senior police officer was on Wednesday transferred and attached with police headquarters, a step that followed an outcry over halting of fruit-laden trucks from Kashmir valley to outside markets.
'First they will say Kashmiris are not good enough to be Indians, then it will be Muslims are not good enough to be Indians, then they will start a conflict within Hindus that Dalits are not Indians'
The latest developments from the violence-hit valley.
'The Abdullah family is the problem and facilitator of the instability that we are seeing in Kashmir.'
The BJP members asked the government why it was not coming forward to condemn Geelani's action.
The incident took place at Tumchi Nowpora of Pulwama district in South Kashmir when the labourer, Mukesh Kumar, was in the market to buy some vegetables.
"If we (the Kashmiris) don't talk about it (dialogue), who will? Not a Bihari, not a Punjabi," she said.
Mukhtar Khan, Yasin Dar and Channi Anand -- three photojournalists working with the Associated Press (AP) -- were among those who were awarded the Pulitzer on Monday night.
It was an emotional moment for the people of Kashmir when the PM flagged off the bus along with Gandhi.
In the wake of notices issued to the Jammu and Kashmir Chief Minister Omar Abdullah and several others by the State Accountability Commission, Opposition parties on Friday staged a protest and later walked out from the Jammu and Kashmir Legislative Assembly demanding a debate over the issue.
India would find itself severely compromised if called upon to handle a border war with China and put down a staged Egyptian style uprising in Kashmir simultaneously, says Vivek Gumaste
'The politicians waiting to grab the space left behind by Omar Abdullah and Mehbooba Mufti do not have any credentials,' says Athar Parvaiz.
Political parties and leaders wait with bated breath for the Haryana and Jammu-Kashmir assembly poll results on Tuesday.
In the petition, Congress activist Tehseen Poonawalla ought withdrawal of 'curfew/restrictions' and release of leaders like former chief ministers Omar Abdullah and Mehbooba Mufti.
The opposition Peoples Democratic Party has decided to vote in favour of the resolution seeking clemency for Afzal Guru to be tabled in the state assembly during its forthcoming short session beginning in Srinagar on Monday.
© 2026 Rediff.com - Advertise with us - Disclaimer - Privacy Policy - Sitemap - Feedback - About us - Terms of use - Grievances