Girish Chandra Murmu paid the price for ‘venting his views’: Congress’ Adhir Ranjan Chowdhury on resignation of J&K L-G

Adhir Ranjan Chowdhury questions Girish Chandra Murmu’s resignation as J&K Lieutenant Governor

Senior Congress leader Adhir Ranjan Chowdhury on Friday questioned the resignation of Jammu & Kashmir’s first Lieutenant Governor Girish Chandra Murmu. He alleged that the former IAS officer paid the price for ‘venting his views’.

“The question is, why the 1st LG of UT JAMMU AND KASHMIR has tendered his resignation? Voluntary or instructed? Whether he has been failed to hoodwink the people that everything is going hunky-dory?” the leader of the Congress in the Lok Sabha said in a tweet.

“I think he has committed a great wrong by venting his views much to the embarrassment of the govt and got axed. You may term it as #MurmuSyndrome,” he added.

Murmu resigned as the Lieutenant Governor of Jammu & Kashmir on Wednesday night. The government has appointed him as the new Comptroller and Auditor General (CAG) of India.

His resignation comes days after a controversy over reports that quoted him saying that elections in Jammu and Kashmir can be held after the ongoing delimitation exercise. The Election Commission has reacted to his reported remarks sharply. In a strongly-worded statement, the ECI had said that decisions on timing of elections could only be made by it.

The Modi government had on August 5 last year abrogated Jammu and Kashmir’s special status and bifurcated the state into two Union Territories.

The Central rule was imposed in the erstwhile state of Jammu and Kashmir in mid 2018 after the BJP pulled out of an alliance government headed by PDP chief Mehbooba Mufti. A year later in 2019, the government stripped Jammu and Kashmir of its statehood.

Murmu, who quit as the Lt Governor of Jammu and Kashmir on Thursday, has been appointed as the new Comptroller and Auditor General (CAG) of India.

Senior BJP leader and former Union minister Manoj Sinha was on Friday sworn in as the new Lieutenant Governor of Jammu and Kashmir. He became the first political leader to take charge of the Union Territory.

The Union Territory of J&K came into being on October 31, 2019, after the state was reorganised and bifurcated into two Union Territories — Jammu and Kashmir division (with a Legislative Assembly); and Ladakh division.