SRINAGAR: Omar Abdullah on Friday became the first elected Chief Minister of the Jammu and Kashmir Union Territory to unfurl the tricolour and preside over the main Independence Day function in Srinagar. He said no major announcement came on the day from Delhi.Omar, who took over as the first Chief Minister of J&K UT in October last year, unfurled the tricolour at the main I-Day function at Bakshi Stadium in Srinagar.The CM was presented with a guard of honour before inspecting the contingents taking part in the parade. He also took the salute during the march past at the low-key Independence Day celebrations, held in the wake of the cloudburst tragedy in Kishtwar in which 46 people have been killed and dozens are still missing.On 5 August 2019, the Centre scrapped J&K’s special status and downgraded and bifurcated the erstwhile J&K state into two Union Territories, Jammu and Kashmir (with a legislature) and Ladakh (without a legislature).Since 2020, the Lieutenant Governor had been unfurling the tricolour on I-Day in J&K. After the fall of the Mehbooba Mufti-led PDP-BJP coalition government in June 2018, then Governor, the late Satyapal Malik, unfurled the tricolour for two years, August 15, 2018, and August 15, 2019. PDP chief Mehbooba Mufti was the last Chief Minister of the erstwhile J&K state to preside over the I-Day function in Srinagar in 2017.In his I-Day address, Omar said over six years had passed since the people of J&K last heard their representative address them from the venue. “It has been 11 years since I last spoke from this platform as Chief Minister of a state,” he said.“In these 10–11 years, a lot has changed. When I was standing here last time, I was CM of the J&K state, in this country we had our own identity, we had a special status, we had our own flag and our own constitution. Today, none of those remain. Today, we don’t even have statehood,” he said.
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