‘Waste Of Money’ But Dogra Tradition of Moving Capital Twice A Year Set To Stay In J&K outlookindia.com

The BJP, which takes pride in having got rid of the special status granted to Jammu & Kashmir through Article 370 of the Constitution, is all for preserving two vestiges of the pre-1947 Dogra monarchy: two capitals and the ‘darbar move’ from winter capital Jammu to summer capital Srinagar in April-May, and from Srinagar to Jammu in October-November. The practice of shifting the seat of government twice a year was started by Dogra king Maharaja Ranbir Singh in 1872, alongside the int­roduction of the Ranbir Penal Code, which continued to be used instead of the Indian Penal Code in J&K so long as Article 370 was in force. “This won’t be changed,” says the BJP’s J&K general secretary Ashok Koul, though the party’s state spokesman Arun Gupta says it is the government’s prerogative to take a call. “But our position is that the arrangement of having two capital cities and the durbar move must continue,” says Gupta.