The Jammu and Kashmir Assembly is back in action after more than five years of dormancy but Kashmir’s hard-to-please politicians are continuing to fume.
For, all the “action” the Assembly is witnessing is inevitably followed by a “cut”.
Lt governor Manoj Sinha’s administration has allowed the makers of Maharani, a Hindi-language TV series starring Huma Qureshi, to shoot inside the Assembly complex.
The building is therefore crawling with reel-life “legislators”, rubbing salt in the wounds of Jammu and Kashmir’s real-life politicians who have been frozen out of the Assembly since 2018.
The series is inspired by political events that took place in Bihar in the 1990s when Lalu Prasad, forced to resign as chief minister in connection with the fodder scam, installed wife Rabri Devi as his successor.
Officials said the Maharani crew had begun shooting in the complex for its third season in October last year. The first two seasons too were reportedly shot in the Assembly complex, turned quite the ideal place for filming in the absence of the bustle of real politics.
However, the matter has become public knowledge only now – a situation imaginable perhaps only in a place drained of normal life by the jackboot.
An appalled Omar Abdullah, former chief minister, has slammed the administration’s decision to turn the Assembly into a film set as an “absolute shame”. He has posted multiple pictures of shooting being carried out in the building.
“The true face of ‘the mother of democracy’, where once elected representatives of the people from all parties, religions, backgrounds & parts of J&K legislated on matters of great importance now actors & extras use it as a set for TV dramas,” the former chief minister posted on X on Friday.
“What a shame that the BJP driven government in J&K has reduced the symbol of democracy, where they once sat & governed, to this sorry state of affairs. They (Maharani’s makers) even have a fake CM coming out of an office I was privileged to occupy for 6 years. What an absolute shame!!!!”
Jammu and Kashmir has been without a functioning Assembly since then governor Satya Pal Malik dissolved the House on December 20, 2018, about six months after the BJP withdrew support to the Mehbooba Mufti government.
Maharani would do well to match the drama that had unfolded in the run-up to the dissolution.
In November 2018, Mehbooba, promised support by rival Omar, had staked claim to form the government again.
She claims she tried to fax her claim to the governor’s office but it did not go through. Governor Malik then said the fax machine at his office was broken.
His claim became a butt of jokes, prompting Omar to wonder about the “strange fax machine which works and stops as per different directions”.
“It does not receive the letter for claim for government formation but letter ordering dissolution of assembly is sent through it. It is like traffic men in Srinagar who allow one way traffic on roads,” Omar had said. “This is also a one way fax, there is no incoming fax but only outgoing fax.”
