Defending the abrogation of Article 370 of the Constitution, the Centre told the Supreme Court that the entire region of Jammu and Kashmir has witnessed an ”unprecedented” era of peace, progress and prosperity, with street violence, orchestrated by terrorists and secessionist networks, becoming “a thing of the past.” Referring to the “characteristic security situation” in the region, the Centre said organized stone pelting incidents connected with terrorism-separatist agenda, which were as high as 1,767 in 2018 has come down to zero in 2023 till date and casualty of security personnel has shown a 65.9 per cent decline in 2022 as compared to 2018.
The Centre’s affidavit will be taken up on Tuesday by a five-judge Constitution bench headed by Chief Justice DY Chandrachud, which is scheduled to hear a batch of petitions challenging the decision to abrogate Article 370 that had given special status to Jammu and Kashmir. On August 5, 2019, the Centre decided to strip the erstwhile state of J&K of special status and bifurcate it into two Union Territories. Several petitions challenging the Centre’s decision to abrogate the provisions of Article 370 and the Jammu and Kashmir Reorganisation Act, 2019, which split J-K into two Union Territories–Jammu and Kashmir, and Ladakh–were referred to a Constitution bench in 2019.
The Centre contended that the “historic constitutional step” being challenged has brought unprecedented development, progress, security and stability to the region, which was often missing during the old Article 370 regime.