Farooq Abdullah
Abdullah in 2011
Chair of the People's Alliance for Gupkar Declaration
Assumed office
20 October 2020
Vice-chairMehbooba Mufti
Preceded byPosition established
Member of Parliament, Lok Sabha
Assumed office
16 April 2017
Preceded byTariq Hameed Karra
ConstituencySrinagar
In office
13 May 2009 – 12 May 2014
Preceded byOmar Abdullah
Succeeded byTariq Hameed Karra
ConstituencySrinagar
In office
6 January 1980 – 5 January 1983
Preceded byBegum Akbar Jehan Abdullah
Succeeded byAbdul Rashid Kabuli
ConstituencySrinagar
4th Chief Minister of Jammu and Kashmir
In office
9 October 1996 – 18 October 2002
GovernorK. V. Krishna Rao
Girish Chandra Saxena
Preceded byPresident's Rule
Succeeded byMufti Mohammad Sayeed
In office
7 November 1986 – 18 January 1990
GovernorJagmohan Malhotra
K. V. Krishna Rao
Preceded byGovernor's Rule
Succeeded byGovernor's Rule
In office
8 September 1982 – 2 July 1984
GovernorBraj Kumar Nehru
Jagmohan Malhotra
Preceded bySheikh Abdullah
Succeeded byGhulam Mohammad Shah
Minister of New and Renewable Energy India
In office
28 May 2009 – 26 May 2014
PresidentPratibha Patil
Pranab Mukherjee
Prime MinisterManmohan Singh
Preceded byVilas Muttemwar
Succeeded byPiyush Goyal
President Jammu & Kashmir National Conference
In office
1981 - 2002
Preceded bySheikh Abdullah
Succeeded byOmar Abdullah
Assumed office
2009
Working PresidentOmar Abdullah
Preceded byOmar Abdullah
Personal details
Born (1937-10-21) 21 October 1937
Srinagar, Jammu and Kashmir, British India
Political partyJammu & Kashmir National Conference
SpouseMollie Abdullah[1]
RelationsOmer abdullah son, Sara Pilot daughters and other 2 daughters,
Children
Residence(s)Gupkar Road Srinagar, Kashmir
Alma materTyndale Biscoe School

Farooq Abdullah (born 21 October 1937) is an Indian politician and current President of Jammu & Kashmir National Conference. He has served as the Chief Minister of Jammu and Kashmir on several occasions since 1982, and as the union minister for New and Renewable Energy between 2009 and 2014. He is the son of the 1st elected Chief Minister of Jammu and Kashmir Sheikh Abdullah, and father of former Chief Minister of Jammu and Kashmir Omar Abdullah.

Farooq Abdullah stands between Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and President of India Pranab Mukherjee with Vice President of India Mohammad Hamid Ansari on far left at the Presidential Palace in New Delhi, India in 2013.

Early life and education

Farooq Abdullah was born to the veteran statesman and National Conference leader Sheikh Abdullah and Begum Akbar Jehan Abdullah. He studied at Tyndale Biscoe School, and subsequently received his MBBS degree from SMS Medical College, Jaipur. He subsequently travelled to the UK to practice medicine.[2]

Family

He is married to Molly, a nurse of British origin. They have a son, Omar, and three daughters, Safia, Hinna, and Sara. Their son Omar Abdullah is also involved in state and national politics, who was a member of the Lok Sabha and was the chief minister of Jammu and Kashmir. Sara was married to Congress leader Sachin Pilot, whose divorce news has come recently.[3]

Political career

Entry into politics

Abdullah was elected to the Lok Sabha unopposed [4] from Srinagar Lok Sabha constituency in the 1980 General Election.

Chief Minister, 1982–1984

Abdullah was a novice in the political arena of Jammu and Kashmir when he was appointed president of the National Conference in August 1981. His main qualification was that he was the son of Sheikh Abdullah. After his father's death in 1982, Farooq Abdullah became the chief minister of the state. In 1984, a faction of the National conference led by his brother-in-law Ghulam Mohammad Shah broke away, leading to the collapse of his government and his dismissal. Shah subsequently became the Chief Minister with the support of the Congress.

1984–1996

In 1986, G.M. Shah's government was dismissed after the communal 1986 Kashmir riots in South Kashmir, and a new National Conference–Congress government was sworn in with Abdullah as the chief minister, after the Rajiv-Farooq accord.

A new election was held in 1987 and the National Conference–Congress alliance won the election amid allegations of fraud. This period saw a rise in militancy in the state, with the return of trained militants in J&K and incidents that included the kidnapping of the daughter of the Home Minister Mufti Mohammad Sayeed. The period also witnessed the exodus of Kashmiri Pandits from the Kashmir valley. Subsequently, Farooq Abdullah resigned in protest after Jagmohan was appointed the governor, and the state's assembly was dismissed.[5][6] He subsequently moved to the United Kingdom.[7]

Chief Minister, 1996–2002

After returning to India, and winning the Legislative Assembly elections in 1996, Abdullah was once again sworn in as chief minister of the state, his fifth time. His government lasted for a full six-year term. In 1999, the National Conference joined the Atal Bihari Vajpayee led National Democratic Alliance, and his son Omar Abdullah was subsequently appointed a union minister of state for External Affairs.

Subsequent political career

In the 2002 Legislative Assembly elections, Omar Abdullah was chosen to lead the National Conference, while Farooq Abdullah intended to continue his political career at the Central level. The National Conference lost the election and a coalition government headed by Mufti Mohammad Sayeed took office.On that year Former Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee in 2002 promised to make Abdullah the vice president, but later reneged on his promise.

Farooq Abdullah was subsequently elected to the Rajya Sabha in 2002 from Jammu and Kashmir and re-elected in 2009. He resigned from the Rajya Sabha in May 2009 and won a seat in the Lok Sabha from Srinagar.[8] Abdullah joined the United Progressive Alliance government as a Cabinet Minister of New and Renewable Energy.

Farooq Abdullah meets with Princess Astrid of Belgium in 2013 in New Delhi.
Farooq Abdullah with the President of Mongolia Tsakhia Elbegdorj during his oath taking ceremony in Ulaanbaatar in 2013.

Abdullah contested the Srinagar Lok Sabha seat again in the 2014 General Election, but was defeated by the People's Democratic Party candidate Tariq Hameed Karra. In 2017, Tariq Hameed Karra resigned from the position, leading to a by-election for the Srinagar parliamentary seat. Abdullah got 48,555 votes and defeated PDP candidate Nazir Ahmed Khan by 10,700 votes.[9]

On 16 September 2019, Abdullah became the first mainstream politician to be detained under the Public Safety Act. Prior to this, Abdullah was under house arrest since the scrapping of Article 370 of the Constitution of India.[10] He was released from house detention under the PSA after seven and a half months on 13 March 2020.[11]

In 2022, before the election of the President of India, Mamata Bannerjee along with several other opposition leaders had proposed Abdullah's name as the Opposition's candidate. But Abdullah declined the offer stating that he wanted to remain in active politics for more years and was concentrated in the Kashmir Union Territory issue.[12]

370 Hearing

After his son Omar Abdullah, Farooq Abdullah made his presence in the Supreme court of India in relation to Article 370 hearing.

References

  1. ↑ "Members : Lok Sabha".
  2. ↑ "Farooq Abdullah Biography - About family, political life, awards won, history". elections.in. 21 October 1937. Retrieved 25 August 2020.
  3. ↑ "Sachin Pilot and Sara Abdullah 'divorced', reveals poll affidavit". The Week. Retrieved 17 December 2023.
  4. ↑ "TitlePage-VolI_LS99.PDF" (PDF). Retrieved 16 August 2018.
  5. ↑ Koithara, Verghese (2004). Crafting peace in Kashmir : through a realist lens. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage. pp. 61–62. ISBN 978-0-7619-3262-8. OCLC 237902298.
  6. ↑ Sabharwal, Gopa (2017), India Since 1947: The Independent Years, Penguin, p. 282, ISBN 9789352140893
  7. ↑ Dulat, Amarjeet Singh (2015). Kashmir: The Vajpayee Years. Harper Collins. ISBN 978-9-3517-7066-4.
  8. ↑ "Alphabetical List Of Former Members Of Rajya Sabha Since 1952". 164.100.47.5. Retrieved 16 August 2018.
  9. ↑ "Srinagar By-Election: Farooq Abdullah Beats PDP Candidate In Key Contest". Ndtv.com. 15 April 2017. Retrieved 16 August 2018.
  10. ↑ "Farooq Abdullah, 83, Detained Under Tough Public Safety Act". Ndtv.com. 16 September 2019. Retrieved 16 September 2019.
  11. ↑ "Farooq Abdullah's detention order revoked after seven-and-half months of captivity; 82-yr-old Srinagar MP was under house arrest". Firstpost. 13 March 2020. Retrieved 13 March 2020.
  12. ↑ "Farooq Abdullah Declines To Be Opposition's Presidential Candidate". NDTV.com. Retrieved 18 June 2022.
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