Omar Abdullah calls for protection of Gujjar community’s ST reservation

SRINAGAR — A day after Lok Sabha passed the ST bill giving reservation to the Pahari Ethnic Community in the ST list of J&K, former chief minister and NC vice-president Omar Abdullah on Wednesday said that the share Gujjar community get from ST reservation must be guaranteed and protected.

Speaking to reporters in Jammu, Omar Abdullah as per the news agency KNS said that NC has always supported reservation to Paharis, but share to Gujjar community must also be protected.

Lok Sabha on Wednesday passed the Constitution (Jammu and Kashmir) Scheduled Tribes Order (Amendment) Bill 2024 that seeks to add the Pahari Ethnic Group, Padari Tribes, Koli and Gadha Brahmin to the ST list of J&K.

Omar while taking a dig at BJP said the saffron party has no courage to hold Parliamentary and Assembly elections simultaneously.

“Despite the abrogation of Article 370, the implementation of new laws, alterations in constituency boundaries through the delimitation process, reservations for various communities, leveraging religious sentiments, pumping in substantial amounts of money, the BJP can still not muster the courage to conduct simultaneous polls in J&K,” he said.