Omar Abdullah’s sister’s plea seeking his release to be heard by SC on Thursday

The Supreme Court said on Tuesday that it will hear the plea challenging the detention of National Conference leader and former Jammu and Kashmir Chief Minister Omar Abdullah on Wednesday, February 12.

Omar’s sister and daughter to Farooq Abdullah– also under detention– Sara Abdullah Pilot, filed the plea on Monday claiming Omar was no threat to law and order and questioned the legality of the grounds cited in a government dossier for Omar’s detention ordered last Thursday, August 6, under the J&K Public Safety Act, 1978.

The police dossier charges Omar Abdullah with use of “dirty politics” over the revocation of Article 370 and for allegedly adopting a radical methodology by “instigating general masses” against the policies of the central government”.

It also alleged that Abdullah’s influence was a threat because he was “able to convince the electorate to come out and vote in huge numbers even during peak militancy and poll boycotts.”

Several political parties including the Congress and the Left have slammed the charges. Omar’s sister’s petition seeks quashing of the detention order.

“The detention order is arbitrary, vague, irrelevant, whimsical and fanciful and deserves to be quashed by an appropriate writ of this court,” Pilot’s petition says.

It also alleges that Omar’s detention was merely meant to silence the opposition to the abrogation of Article 370 of the Constitution, which did away with Jammu and Kashmir’s special status and its bifurcation into two union territories giving the Centre greater control of its administration.

The petition also alleges that Omar Abdullah, Farooq Abdullah and several other political leaders both from the National Conference and outside it despite having served the state and the union over several years.

Senior advocate Kapil Sibal had mentioned the plea for urgent listing before a bench headed by Justice N V Ramana.

“It is rare that those who have served the nation as members of Parliament, Chief Ministers of a state, ministers in the Union and have always stood by the national aspirations of India are now perceived as a threat to the state,” the plea said.

The plea also claimed that Omar’s statements and messages during the period up to his first detention called for peace and co-operation as against government’s claim of being inflammatory and a threat to the maintenance of public order.

The PSA has two sections — public order and threat to the security of the state. The former allows detention without trial for six months and the latter for two years.

Omar Abdullah was the first to be put under house arrest on August 4, 2019 following the abrogation of the Article 370 and bifurcation of the erstwhile state of Jammu and Kashmir into two Union Territories.