Article 370 Is Back at the Centre of J&K Politics — But the NC Has a Problem of Its Own
By: News Desk | 03 September 2026
Srinagar: For the National Conference, Article 370 was never supposed to become a footnote.
Yet for much of the period since the party returned to power in Jammu and Kashmir, the political conversation has increasingly revolved around something more immediate: restoration of statehood.
That distinction has now become impossible to ignore.
With the NC facing criticism from within its own ranks and from political rivals over what some describe as a softer or more pragmatic approach to Article 370, the party has once again put the restoration of the constitutional provision firmly back on the political table.
The renewed assertion comes at a delicate moment.
The Bharatiya Janata Party insists that the 2019 constitutional changes are settled.
The Supreme Court has upheld the abrogation.
The Union government continues to promise restoration of statehood but has not provided a publicly definitive timetable.
And inside the National Conference itself, Srinagar MP Aga Ruhullah Mehdi has accused the leadership of allowing the Article 370 issue to recede behind the statehood demand.
The result is a curious political situation:
The NC is once again speaking strongly about Article 370 — but it is doing so while facing questions about whether it has already compromised on the very issue that helped define its electoral politics after 2019.
The NC Says Article 370 Was Never Abandoned
The party’s leadership has been emphatic that its position has not changed.
In April, NC president Farooq Abdullah said restoration of Article 370 remained the party’s core agenda and that there was no question of stepping back from the struggle.
The message was repeated again around the seventh anniversary of the August 2019 changes.
Farooq Abdullah reiterated the demand for restoration of Article 370 and full statehood, while stressing that the political struggle would continue through democratic and constitutional means.
That matters because the NC is now trying to establish a clear distinction between what it is doing in government and what it continues to demand politically.
The party can pursue governance, jobs, infrastructure and statehood while simultaneously maintaining that the larger constitutional question has not disappeared from its political programme.
That is the position the leadership is now seeking to reinforce.
But Then Why Did Article 370 Seem to Take a Back Seat?
This is where the criticism becomes more complicated.
The NC’s 2024 Assembly election campaign was conducted in a political environment where restoration of statehood was a major immediate demand.
After forming the government, the party has repeatedly pressed the Centre on statehood.
Omar Abdullah has argued that a restored state government would have greater authority and that the continued Union Territory arrangement limits the elected government’s room to govern effectively.
The shift in emphasis has therefore been partly strategic.
Statehood is politically achievable.
Article 370 is far more difficult.
The difference is not ideological alone.
It is constitutional reality.
The Supreme Court’s December 2023 judgment unanimously upheld the abrogation of Article 370. The Court described the provision as temporary and upheld the constitutional orders through which the Centre made it inoperative.
That ruling dramatically changed the legal terrain.
The NC can continue to demand restoration as a political objective.
But it cannot honestly present the 2019 abrogation as a question that remains awaiting a Supreme Court ruling.
That battle has already been decided by the country’s highest court.
The political argument, however, has not ended.
And that distinction is becoming increasingly important.
Ruhullah Mehdi Has Turned the Internal Debate Into a Public Fight
The most damaging criticism of the NC’s approach has not come from the BJP.
It has come from within the party.
Aga Ruhullah Mehdi, the NC’s Srinagar MP, has repeatedly argued that the party should not reduce the political struggle to statehood.
In June, he said restoration of Article 370 remained a core demand and argued that the campaign should go beyond statehood to address constitutional protections and the rights of Jammu and Kashmir’s people.
In July, he went further, maintaining that Article 370 — rather than statehood alone — remained his political priority.
Then came his direct criticism of the party leadership.
In a letter to Farooq Abdullah in August, Mehdi accused the NC of taking a position on statehood that was effectively no different from the BJP’s, arguing that the party was failing to honour the larger constitutional promise associated with its electoral mandate.
This was no longer an argument between the NC and BJP.
It was an argument inside the NC itself.
And that makes it politically much more consequential.
Farooq Abdullah’s Challenge Changed the Equation
Instead of allowing the disagreement to remain an internal ideological dispute, Farooq Abdullah publicly challenged Mehdi.
The NC patriarch asked him, in effect, to leave the party and seek a fresh electoral mandate if he believed the leadership had betrayed the electorate.
Mehdi then announced his decision to resign from both the Lok Sabha and the National Conference, turning an internal disagreement into one of the party’s most serious political crises in recent years.
The episode matters beyond the personalities involved.
It raises a question that the NC leadership can no longer easily avoid:
What exactly did the party promise its voters on Article 370, and how does that promise translate into policy after the Supreme Court’s 2023 verdict?
That is a much harder question than simply repeating the slogan of restoration.
The Legal Reality Changed in December 2023
Any serious discussion of Article 370 in 2026 has to begin with the Supreme Court judgment.
On December 11, 2023, a five-judge Constitution Bench unanimously upheld the Centre’s decision to make Article 370 inoperative.
The Court also upheld the application of the Indian Constitution to Jammu and Kashmir and rejected the argument that J&K retained an element of sovereignty after accession to India.
At the same time, the Court directed that statehood be restored at the earliest and as soon as possible.
The distinction is critical.
Article 370: The abrogation was upheld.
Statehood: The Court directed restoration at the earliest, while leaving aspects of the reorganisation question open because the Union had assured the Court that J&K’s statehood would be restored.
This is why statehood has become the more immediate constitutional-political battle.
The NC knows this.
The BJP knows this.
And voters increasingly understand the difference.
The NC’s Two-Level Strategy
The party therefore appears to be operating on two tracks.
Track One: Statehood
This is the immediate political demand.
Omar Abdullah’s government can campaign for it.
The Assembly can debate it.
The NC can mobilise public opinion around it.
Opposition parties can support it.
And the Union government can ultimately act on it.
Track Two: Article 370
This is the longer and much more difficult political struggle.
The NC can maintain that the 2019 decision was unjust, unconstitutional in its political conception or harmful to J&K’s identity.
It can continue to campaign for restoration.
But it now operates in the shadow of a binding Supreme Court judgment that upheld the abrogation.
That makes the Article 370 demand more political and ideological than immediately executable.
And that is precisely why internal disagreements over strategy have become sharper.
For the NC, Article 370 Is About More Than a Constitutional Provision
There is another dimension that is sometimes lost in legal arguments.
For the National Conference, Article 370 is not simply a clause in the Constitution.
It represents a particular conception of Jammu and Kashmir’s relationship with the Union.
It is linked to questions of political identity, federalism, land and employment protections, local representation and the historical understanding of accession.
That is why the party continues to use phrases such as rights, dignity, identity and constitutional safeguards alongside the demand for restoration.
For many supporters in the Valley, the issue has emotional significance beyond its legal mechanics.
This explains why simply declaring the matter “closed” has limited political effect.
A court can settle constitutional validity.
It cannot automatically erase a political grievance.
BJP’s Answer Is Much Simpler
The BJP’s position is fundamentally different.
It argues that Article 370 was temporary, that its abrogation has been constitutionally upheld and that Jammu and Kashmir is now fully integrated into India’s constitutional framework.
The party has repeatedly rejected calls for restoration.
Its response to recent appeals from Mirwaiz Umar Farooq was blunt: there is no question of bringing Article 370 back.
For the BJP, reopening the issue is not a demand for political reconciliation.
It is an attempt to reverse what the party considers the culmination of constitutional integration.
That makes Article 370 one of the few J&K issues where the ideological distance between the BJP and NC remains almost absolute.
The Political Problem for Omar Abdullah
Omar Abdullah has to navigate an unusually narrow political corridor.
As Chief Minister, he has to deal with practical matters:
employment,
infrastructure,
electricity,
investment,
administration,
tourism,
security,
and the functioning of government.
At the same time, as the political heir of the National Conference, he cannot simply abandon the party’s longstanding constitutional position.
That creates a tension between governance politics and identity politics.
The government needs to demonstrate performance.
The party needs to demonstrate ideological consistency.
The two objectives do not always point in the same direction.
That tension explains why statehood has become such an attractive political bridge.
It is concrete enough to campaign on and broad enough to unite different sections of J&K’s political spectrum.
Why Statehood Is Easier to Sell Than Article 370
There is also a practical electoral calculation.
Statehood has wider political acceptability.
The Congress has supported restoration.
Regional parties support it.
The Supreme Court directed that statehood be restored at the earliest.
Even parties that fundamentally disagree over Article 370 can therefore stand together on statehood.
Article 370 is different.
The BJP rejects restoration.
The Supreme Court has upheld the abrogation.
And the Union government’s constitutional position is firmly against reversing the 2019 changes.
That makes Article 370 a far more polarising demand.
For the NC, therefore, insisting on it remains important for ideological credibility.
But focusing exclusively on it would make immediate political bargaining considerably harder.
This is the strategic dilemma.
Ruhullah’s Criticism Hits the NC at Its Most Sensitive Point
Mehdi’s argument has essentially been this:
If the NC won support on the promise of restoring the constitutional rights lost after August 2019, then it cannot reduce the political struggle to statehood alone.
His criticism is powerful precisely because it comes from within the party.
The leadership can dismiss a BJP attack as expected opposition politics.
It is much harder to dismiss criticism from an elected NC parliamentarian who says the party is moving away from its own declared position.
That is why the controversy has generated so much attention.
It forces the NC to explain not simply what it believes, but what it can realistically achieve.
The ‘No Ambiguity’ Argument
Farooq Abdullah’s repeated declarations are therefore partly an effort to close that political gap.
By saying Article 370 remains the NC’s core agenda, the party leadership is sending two messages.
To its supporters:
We have not abandoned the cause.
To internal critics:
You cannot claim the party has formally given it up.
To the BJP:
The constitutional debate has not disappeared politically.
And to voters:
The NC still regards August 2019 as an unresolved political grievance.
Whether voters accept that explanation is another matter.
The Ground Reality Is More Complicated Than Party Resolutions
For ordinary residents, the Article 370 debate exists alongside much more immediate concerns.
Young people want jobs.
Businesses want stability.
Families want reliable public services.
Employees want predictable recruitment.
Tourism operators want visitors.
Farmers and traders want functioning markets.
The administration wants greater powers.
Political parties want electoral support.
That is why constitutional politics and everyday governance increasingly overlap.
A voter may emotionally support the restoration of Article 370 while simultaneously judging the NC government on roads, electricity, recruitment and administration.
Another voter may oppose Article 370 restoration while still supporting statehood.
There is no single “Kashmiri sentiment”.
There are overlapping constituencies, competing priorities and changing political calculations.
Any party that assumes otherwise risks misreading the electorate.
The Valley Is Not Politically Static
The internal NC dispute also reflects a broader change.
For decades, the National Conference was one of the principal vehicles through which mainstream Kashmiri politics expressed its demands for autonomy.
After 2019, that political space changed dramatically.
The party now operates within a Union Territory framework.
Its government has limited powers compared with a full state government.
The Supreme Court has settled the legal challenge to Article 370.
And a younger political generation is asking more direct questions about what existing parties actually deliver.
That environment creates pressure on the NC from both sides.
The BJP challenges it from the right and from Jammu.
More uncompromising voices challenge it from within the Valley.
The party leadership is therefore trying to occupy a difficult middle ground.
The Mirwaiz Factor Adds Another Layer
The recent intervention by Mirwaiz Umar Farooq has complicated the equation further.
The Hurriyat chairman has called for political parties to unite around restoration of Article 370 and statehood, while expressing support for Ruhullah Mehdi’s position.
The BJP has strongly rejected the demand.
This creates an unusual political convergence on one issue between a mainstream parliamentary party figure and a separatist political-religious voice — even though their broader political histories and objectives are very different.
For the NC, that convergence can be politically awkward.
The party wants to retain mainstream democratic legitimacy while continuing to articulate a constitutional grievance.
For the BJP, it provides an opportunity to portray Article 370 restoration as a challenge to the post-2019 constitutional order.
Once again, the political battlefield expands.
Is the NC Being Pragmatic or Diluting Its Position?
That is ultimately the central question.
There are two competing interpretations.
The pragmatic interpretation
The NC understands that statehood is achievable and has therefore prioritised the issue that can realistically produce an institutional change.
Under this view, keeping Article 370 as a longer-term political demand does not amount to abandoning it.
It is simply sequencing priorities.
The dilution interpretation
Critics argue that by placing statehood at the centre of government policy, the NC has effectively moved away from the larger promise on which many supporters expected it to campaign.
Ruhullah Mehdi has made precisely this argument.
Under this interpretation, repeating Article 370 rhetoric after the fact cannot substitute for making it a central political programme.
Both interpretations will continue to compete.
And the NC’s electoral future may depend on which one voters find more convincing.
The BJP’s ‘Closed Chapter’ Argument Has Its Own Political Limits
The BJP’s position has the advantage of legal clarity.
The Supreme Court has upheld the abrogation.
But declaring the political issue closed does not necessarily make it disappear.
Political grievances can survive legal judgments.
The demand for Article 370 restoration may have no straightforward legal route under the existing constitutional framework, but it can still function as a political identity marker.
That distinction is particularly important in Kashmir.
A party can lose a legal battle and still retain a political narrative.
The NC’s challenge is to maintain that narrative without creating expectations that it can deliver something the current constitutional and judicial framework does not permit it to deliver immediately.
What Happens Next?
The NC’s next challenge will be converting declarations into a credible political strategy.
If Article 370 remains a core agenda, voters may reasonably ask:
What is the roadmap?
What can an elected J&K government actually do?
What can the Assembly do?
What can Parliament do?
What is being pursued legally, given the Supreme Court judgment?
What is the party asking the Union government to negotiate?
And how does the party distinguish its Article 370 position from the statehood demand?
These questions are not hostile questions.
They are the natural questions that arise when a political party makes a major constitutional promise.
The Bigger Battle Is Over Political Credibility
The current controversy is therefore about more than Article 370.
It is about credibility.
The BJP wants voters to believe that the post-2019 constitutional order is permanent and that politics should now focus on development and governance.
The NC wants its supporters to believe that the political struggle over the region’s constitutional identity has not ended.
Ruhullah Mehdi wants the NC leadership to prove that distinction through action rather than rhetoric.
The Union government wants statehood separated from any discussion of Article 370.
And a significant section of Kashmir’s political discourse continues to treat the two questions as inseparable.
That is the political fault line now running through Jammu and Kashmir.
Article 370 Is Legally Settled — Politically, It Clearly Is Not
This may be the most accurate way to understand the current moment.
The Supreme Court has spoken on the legality of the 2019 abrogation.
The BJP considers the matter permanently settled.
But the National Conference continues to describe restoration of Article 370 as a political objective.
That means the argument has moved from the courtroom to the political arena.
And that arena is much less predictable.
The NC’s renewed assertion is therefore not evidence that Article 370 is about to return.
It is evidence that the issue remains politically alive.
For the party, abandoning it completely could create a vacuum that more hardline voices would quickly occupy.
But pursuing it as though the Supreme Court had never ruled on it would create unrealistic expectations.
The balancing act is becoming increasingly difficult.
Conclusion: The NC’s Hardest Battle May Be With Itself
The National Conference has once again drawn a line around Article 370.
But the political question confronting the party is no longer simply whether it supports restoration.
It does.
The harder question is what that promise means in the post-2023 legal environment and how the party intends to pursue it while running the government of Jammu and Kashmir.
That is where the disagreement with Ruhullah Mehdi becomes significant.
It exposes a deeper tension between ideological commitment and political pragmatism.
Farooq Abdullah’s leadership says the commitment remains intact.
Mehdi argues that commitment must be visible in the party’s political strategy.
The BJP says the entire chapter is closed.
The Supreme Court has already rejected the legal challenge to the abrogation.
And voters are left watching the political argument unfold while dealing with the practical realities of life under a Union Territory government.
The National Conference may succeed in keeping Article 370 alive as a political demand.
But its real test will be whether it can convince the people of Jammu and Kashmir that it has a credible path forward — not merely a powerful memory of what was lost.
The legal battle may have ended. The political battle clearly has not.
