 Welcome Mr. Tarigami. It's really great to have you with us. So it's three years of Article 370 being revoked. I wanted to ask you, I wanted to begin by asking what is the situation for the political parties? How is the interaction between parties, leaders and people at present? You see the, as far as interaction of political leaders with the common people and interaction within the community of political parties, leaders. You know, we have, we are still passing through a very difficult situation. Since 2009, even before, a lot of restrictions have been imposed. And for us, who are on the other side of the fence, not in agreement with what the government has done, certainly the opportunities for moving around, talking to people, are curtailed, have been restricted time and again under one excuse or the other. And you see, we have been talking about, as far as Kashmir is concerned, Jammu-Kashmir is concerned, it's a very difficult field we are going through. Our people are virtually, virtually feeling like demoralized and hopelessness is prevailing on each one of, each face of the citizens here in this part of the country. So the government at the center had said that revocation of 370 would mean democracy, it would mean representative democracy for people. And in return, it has done the delimitation exercise. What has been the effect of this delimitation? How have people received it? You see, the first thing is that the claims of the government, claims of the government initiating a process, real, genuine democracy on the ground by assaulting the very basic rights of the people, the constitutional rights and through clampdown, through crackdown, not only restricting the movement of all those who are having dissenting voices, but putting them under detention, under Public Safety Act, UAPA, etc. Can you imagine, by denying the very basic rights to the common people, democracy can be restored? You see, our as well as people of Kashmir who have been talking since long, that the reason for eruption of sessionist tendencies, militancy, the basic reasons are the denial of democracy since long, they have been talking about integration and all that even before, those who were at the helm of affairs in the country. And now, of course, this regime which is hyper-nationalistic, which claims to be more patriotic than anybody else, they have done virtually opposite what was required to be done. Now, on 5th of August 2019, you know, our historic state got divided through reorganization act, it got downgraded. For the first time in the Indian federal system, any state is getting downgraded to a union territory status and any state, new states have been created in UP, Andhra Pradesh, Bihar, but after long discussion, seeking the approval of the common people, debating, listening to the common views, listening to the concerns of different shades of opinion, but how the reorganization act, how dismembering, unilaterally the historic state of Jammu, Kashmir and Ladakh, how a historic state got downgraded to a level of virtually a municipality by imposing not only restrictions, imposing assault on the very moments of the common people. Have you ever heard that telephone lines were cut off and there was no communication of a patient with a doctor, there was no communication of the people of Kashmir with outside and even the mother was crying for his son studying outside or doing some work outside Jammu and Kashmir. No contact. Internet was virtually cut off, shut down. I think unprecedented for many months and this happened while doing justice to the people of Kashmir, claiming to integrate the people of Jammu and Kashmir with the Indian Main Street. We were aspiring for the genuine democracy to be restored. We were expecting the authorities to look into the whole course of violence, uncertainties and draw lessons. Instead, they not only tried to disown the whole whatever, whatever the experience we had but added fuel to the fire by dismantling whatever the compact was left between the people of Jammu and Kashmir with the Union of India. They did what was unthinkable earlier. They did. In my opinion, that is the biggest day ever I saw on the basic foundations of unity of the people of Jammu and Kashmir with the Union. And then their claims that democracy and all that. Now I see the media here. Now the rest of the media is becoming like the media in Kashmir but it was first initiated from Kashmir. It continues to be more harsh here. Restrictions on media, restrictions on the movement of the common people and the political leaders. Ask them one question. How many people since 2009 have been arrested? How many have been released? How do people get information? How do they know that the information they are getting from the media or from other sources it is correct or not? How are people living in this situation with the clamp down on the media? That is what you see. I had visited in September itself when our General Secretary Sitaram Yachuri applied for in the Supreme Court for my getting me treated in all-in-a-medical in a suit. I got an opportunity then in September 2019 itself we met some press people, addressed the press conference and I was posed the question why there are no protests. I told them that have you ever reported any one of you any protests from Tihar Jail? You see now the people outside put in the people put in fear at every level frightening the people and forcing them to be silent. This is a forced silence and then claiming to the rest of the country that there is normalcy, how tragic it is. My only concern is that the countrymen are not being taken into confidence. There are institutional like parliament. It has virtually become dysfunctional and even 2019 when reorganization act was being debated for a while in Rajya Sabha how much time, how much hours were given to the honorable members to discuss such an important issue. They are dictating not only outside but in the parliament itself. They want business on their terms. This is what my worry is that not only democracy in Kashmir is suffering but the whole structure of the constitution of India is getting affected. Unfortunately, which will have certainly some adverse impact on the situation in the rest of the country as well. Sir, the opposition parties in Kashmir, in Jammu in Kashmir have tried to respond to the challenge. There is the PAGD. What is the situation with them? What are the options before you? What are your demands? As a PAGD is a combination of some parties. We, the political parties, some of us, most of us, it is in on 4th of August 2019 when rumors were high when Yatra was put on, put a stop when tourists were being pushed to flee, leave the places, leave the hotels. They were virtually forced. It is in that atmosphere we met together and adopted a resolution appealing the Prime Minister of India. Please provide us a chance to meet you, to listen to us. And we resolved that any interference as far as the constitutional guarantees vis-à-vis Jammu in Kashmir are concerned. If anything is unilaterally that will have dangerous implications for the whole of the country for Kashmir and for the rest of the country in future. But returning to our home in the midnight, there was calm down. There was no communication with each other. I had to approach the Supreme Court format getting myself treated or in a medical industry. There are many people who were in jail for longer periods. There are many people, a number of people even now who are in jail. Not only in government Kashmir where there is no surface left, they are in other jails. You see, this is the situation which unfortunately people of the rest of the country are not knowing. You have also... The channels are under the control of the present regime. And the news has become selective. Whatever suits the regime itself, yes, there are certain attempts. There are very credible journalists in our country. But unfortunately they are being harassed by different powers. That is how we do believe that this disrupting the channels of communication with the people of the country, with the people of Kashmir that will have adverse impact in future that will definitely not, it will not serve the purpose of the unity of the country as a whole. So you have also gone to the Supreme Court to try and challenge the abrogation of 370. What is the status of this case right now? I have not only me but many others have approached the Supreme Court. And we fear whatever has been done, this is unconstitutional, this is an assault. And you can well understand we thought that Supreme Court honorable, Supreme Court will listen to us keeping in view the subjectivities, urgency involved. They will find some time to listen to us. Now for the last around three years, what is happening? I had in addition to the original petition, I had another petition for early hearing. Even I don't know what has happened to that application. And on the other hand, the government of India is irrespective of our approaching the Supreme Court expressing our concern. They are going, they are keeping this process open for bulldozing whatever little democratic rights, democratic concerns of the people are there. They don't listen to us, they don't feel concerned about it. And the Elimitation Commission as you put it, we see this commission has been constituted within the provisions of reorganization act, which has been challenged by us, which is under judicial security need. Despite that, the Judicial Justice Commission, delimitation commission has completed whatever exercise, the exercise of overlizing the people, those who are in authority in that league. It was virtually the agenda of the BJP to be more frank, exercise to implement that in the name of delimitation. They have succeeded in, they have done it. But there is no intervention from honorable Supreme Court till today. The government of Jammu and Kashmir and the union government are doing whatever they want to do in the name of development, in the name of law and order, in the name of everything on earth. And we have challenged the land act itself. I have challenged that, the amendment to the land act. But they are still not, they are not concerned about. And taking advantage of that Supreme Court, Supreme Court is not finding time to listen to us, to hear our prayer. So there were a lot of people who issued cautionary notes to the government right from three years ago. But do you think some of those warnings, those notes of caution are coming true, judging by the civilian killings, judging by the way the security forces have behaved? You see, they have been talking about normalcy. We have restored normalcy. And this was at that time of Aburgation Article 37035A, they claim that normalcy will be restored. What is the record for the last three years? Why these unfortunate civilian killings have taken place? It is itself a warning for those who claim that we have done for ensuring normalcy in Jumu and Kashmir. This goes contrary to the claims. And that's why these are the concerns from all of us. That normalcy cannot be restored just by denying the people of Jumu and Kashmir their legitimate rights by creating a political void. Normalcy can be restored when you win over the hearts and minds of the people. I just want to remind you, when we got a chance to meet on-level Prime Minister, something of the whole discussion, Prime Minister said that distances are there between Delhi and Srinagar. Distances are there between mines. And our common aim should be to bridge the gaps, to narrow down the distances. Both up between Delhi and Srinagar and between the minds of the people of Jumu and Kashmir and the government of India. This is what he said. But I have a question as a citizen. Mr. Prime Minister, please explain to the country what exactly you have done since we met to narrow down those gaps. How you have created some sort of a bond, tried to build up that bond, which has virtually was not in a good position, stable position, as he put it. See the concern as a citizen, we have presented before the Honorable Prime Minister there, Home Minister was there. I don't think there was any follow-up. The follow-up is big claims on the TV screens. Headlines are there. There are more experiences about creating headlines. But the ground situation, I must tell my countrymen, that it is not what the government of India is claiming. This is quite contrary to what the government is presenting before the country. The gap is widening, the void is getting widened day by day by denying that democratic rights of the people, by not treating them as citizens of this country, by not doing anything to address the everyday concerns like jobs, like many other issues. Sir, do you think also the gap between Jammu and Kashmir and Ladakh is also growing? You see that is unfortunate. As far as this government is concerned, they have two methods, one creating fear as much as they can, using or misusing different agencies, whether it is ED, whether it is CBI, whether it is NI. This is one. And then by creating division among the population, one community versus another, one region against another, this is the same old tactics, dividing the people more and more so that there is no common bond to protest against the atrocities, to protest against the wrongs done or committed by the government. This is the method being used not only in Jammu and Kashmir, but in rest of the country as also. Now you look at one point at a time when abrogation took place, Leh and Kargil, two districts of one region called Ladakh, Leh people, a Buddhist majority area, they were having certain grievances with the political leadership of the state. Yes, those could have been handled, those could have been sorted out by mutual negotiation, but instead this happened and union parity status was granted to Ladakh. At that time there was some positive reaction from the people of Leh. Now look now after some time the Leh and Kargil people have joined together, the Buddhist Association and the Kargil which is Muslim dominated area and they are demanding six schedule, they are demanding protection of the writers on land, they are demanding protection of the writers of jobs and they are also demanding a status of legislature. This is happening now. In Jammu they tried to put one section against another using even delimitation commission, but nevertheless the pinch of the salt is being felt by different communities living in Jammu region as well. Businesses virtually it has collapsed and there are no jobs as promised. That's why you see on the other hand the price rise, the inflation has created havoc. Now the people are seen through all the propaganda which the government of India has been conducting or suppressing across the country. Jammu-Kashmir-Ladakh is in a very bad shape. We the people Jammu-Kashmir-Ladakh want to just express our concern, restore statehood back, give us the chance to elect our representatives so that a legitimate assembly elected to a legitimate electoral political process. Why are you creating delay? Why don't you allow us to have a government of our choice so that we can discuss the issues and we can sort out our differences. We can sort out and talk out some positive intervention for the betterment of our people in all the regions in all the communities. Thank you very much Mr. Tarigami for joining us. Thank you. Thank you.