‘Monumental loss’: Tributes pour in for J&K ex-guv

JAMMU: The 1982 Asian Games is widely recognised as marking the emergence of the television boom in India. Politically, it was also one of the factors that made Jagmohan Malhotra, then serving his second term as Delhi’s Lieutenant Governor.

Jagmohan -- he mostly went by one name -- was already a name and a face by then. In the mid-1970s, he was a controversial head of the Delhi Development Authority, and between 1975 and 1977, set out to improve the city’s looks under Sanjay Gandhi’s patronage.

Controversy was a constant in the life of Jagmohan, who died in Delhi late on May 3.

He was twice governor of Jammu & Kashmir, once for five years, and the second time, controversially, for five months. He remained as disliked by J&K’S mainstream politicians as he was admired by the Kashmiri Pandits, who believe he saved them by helping their escape from the Valley when calls went out for their extermination. Indeed, on Tuesday, tributes poured in from Jammu.

All three Kashmir-based former chief ministers of the erstwhile state, Farooq Abdullah, Omar Abdullah and Mehbooba Mufti, maintained a stoic silence. But the J&K administration has announced a three-day mourning from May 4 to 6 as a mark of respect to Jagmohan, who joined the BJP after his second, short stint as J&K governor (which came under the VP Singh government). It is believed that the government’s stand on J&K didn’t match his own; and even the Congress, with which he was associated for a decade-and-half, working closely with Indira, Sanjay and Rajiv Gandhi, didn’t approve of his muscular approach .

Prime Minister Narendra

Modi termed Jagmohan‘s death a “monumental loss for the nation”.

Ajay Chrungoo, the leader of Panun Kashmir, a frontal organisation of Kashmiri Pandits, said, “At that time, he was the only person who elicited hope among Hindus displaced from Kashmir because of Pakistansponsored terrorism...”

Vijai Kapoor, former LG of Delhi, said: “His two major contributions are large green spaces, which Delhi has today and large scale planned development.”

Congress leader Ajay Maken remembered him as a “fierce administrator” and a “kind soul”.