Srinagar, Jan 18: PDP president Mehbooba Mufti on Wednesday said the solution to the Kashmir problem is within the framework of the constitution but the starting point for any reconciliation will have to be the restoration of the special status and statehood to Jammu and Kashmir.
“There is no way other than reconciliation in Jammu and Kashmir but the starting point for it will be the restoration of whatever has been snatched from the (erstwhile) state,” Mufti told reporters here.
She was responding to a question about Pakistani Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif’s statement on Kashmir in an interview with Dubai-based Al Arabiya TV.
“I do not know what he (Sharif) has said, but we in the PDP believe that the solution to this issue is within the Constitution of the country. It is the Constitution that had given a special status to Jammu and Kashmir,” the former Union minister said.
She said her party wants the relations between India and Pakistan to improve. “We want the relations between the two countries to improve and that more routes across the border are opened…. And there should be free movement and trade as well,” the People’s Democratic Party (PDP) chief said.
