Why can’t J&K have Hindu CM, asks minister

Raising the Hindu card in the Muslim majority state of Jammu and Kashmir, he asked why a Hindu cannot become chief minister here “when A R Antulay can become chief minister of Maharashtra which has only 2 per cent Muslim population”.

He even referred to former president A P J Abdul Kalam and former prime minister Dr Manmohan Singh to assert his point. “If we can have A P J Abdul Kalam as President of India from among our 12 per cent Muslim brethren, or if we can keep Sardar Sahab (Manmohan Singh) with only two per cent Sikh population as our Prime Minister for 10 years… why we cannot have a Hindu chief minister in the state?’’ “Have you ever given a thought to it?” Sharma asked, regretting that “What can be done as you people (Hindus) will never raise your voice against their dominance”.

“What can be done if you keep on following them like lambs,” he said in an apparent reference to Muslim leaders from Valley. He also went on to cite more instances of discrimination against Jammu region. “The list of agricultural technocrats is released across the state, but those hailing from there (Valley) get the appointment letters, while youth from Jammu continue to move here and there for jobs,” he said.

Sharma further asked “whether they have ever thought as to how many employees had been working in the civil secretariat and how many of them were Hindus. “Of the 7,000 employees working there, hardly 200 were Hindus,” he quickly said.