No return to Jammu and Kashmir's autonomy: Indian home minister

India's Home Minister Amit Shah has said that his party will never allow the restoration of autonomy to the disputed Jammu and Kashmir region, which was abrogated by the ruling Hindu nationalist government in 2019.

"Article 370 is history and it can never come back and we will never allow it to be restored," Shah told reporters on Friday after releasing Bharatiya Janata Party's manifesto for the upcoming assembly elections in Jammu and Kashmir.

The abrogation of Articles 370 and 35A of the Indian Constitution, which granted Kashmir autonomy within the Indian Union, was a recurring election promise of India's rightwing BJP, along with the construction of a temple over a demolished medieval mosque and a uniform civil code.

"Our aim is peaceful and prosperous and developed Jammu and Kashmir. Since independence Jammu and Kashmir has been important for our party and we have always tried to keep this land intact with India. Our party believes that J&K has always been part of India and it will remain so," Shah said.

He asked India’s leader of opposition Rahul Gandhi to clarify his stand on the issue of autonomy after Gandhi's party entered into a seat-sharing arrangement with the region's oldest party, the National Conference, which has made restoration of autonomy a key election plank.

Gandhi said on Wednesday that his party’s priority will be to work for the restoration of statehood to Jammu and Kashmir, which was also downgraded into a federally ruled territory in 2019.

Gandhi's Congress party had condemned the manner in which the Muslim-majority region’s autonomous position was scrapped.

First local assembly elections

Since 2019, New Delhi has been ruling Jammu and Kashmir directly through a Lieutenant Governor.

The last elections to the legislative assembly of the erstwhile autonomous state were held in 2014. Beginning September 18, a three-phased election will be held for the much-weakened local assembly that is widely being seen as a referendum on BJP’s 2019 decision.

The scrapping of the autonomous character has made it possible for outsiders to buy properties and take government employment, which were barred in the earlier arrangement. This has raised fears among the locals that they would be reduced to a minority and economically disempowered as well.

The region's two largest political parties, the National Conference and the People’s Democratic Party, have made the restoration of autonomy a key poll plank.

The Congress has entered into a pre-poll seat-sharing arrangement with the National Conference, drawing flak from India’s Home Minister Amit Shah who accused the Congress of "risking nation's unity and security to satiate its greed for power" by allying with the National Conference.

Shah asked whether "Rahul Gandhi and the Congress party support the National Conference’s decision to restore autonomy and thereby push Jammu and Kashmir back into an era of unrest and terrorism?"

Defending its decision to repeal the legislation granting autonomy to Kashmir, the BJP had said that the autonomy was responsible for the raging "anti-India insurgency" in the region and promoted separatism and discrimination.

In the upcoming elections, the NC-Congress alliance and PDP are expected to win the majority of the 47 seats in the Muslim-majority Kashmir region while the BJP is likely to win the majority of the 43 seats in the Hindu-dominated areas of the Jammu region.

The Muslim-majority region of Kashmir is claimed by both Pakistan and India in full, but each administers only part of it. Rebel groups have waged an insurgency since 1989, demanding independence for the territory or its merger with Pakistan. The conflict has killed tens of thousands of civilians, soldiers and rebels.