Governor of August 5: Satya Pal Malik’s Life Ends on Kashmir’s Most Fateful Date

What a striking coincidence. Satya Pal Malik, the last governor of Jammu and Kashmir, passed away on August 5 — the very date Article 370 was abrogated under his watch in 2019. Six years to the day that changed Jammu and Kashmir forever, the man who administered that seismic transition quietly breathed his last. History, it seems, keeps its own ledger of poetic timing.

His tenure was marked by paradox: he was sent to Srinagar as a bridge-builder, but ended up presiding over the dismantling of the bridge itself. But in retrospect, he became the mask behind which a monumental, and for many Kashmiris, traumatic decision was taken.

Back in August 2018, when New Delhi was deciding who would succeed N.N. Vohra in Raj Bhavan, there was a clear intent within the Modi government to break with precedent. Out of 10 governors who had served in J&K, six were former top bureaucrats and two army generals. The last political governor had been Dr Karan Singh, who demitted office in 1967. That gap—over half a century—was about to be bridged.

Then Home Minister Rajnath Singh, in an unusually candid moment, told journalists with a wry smile: “It is the Modi government, which is showing courage to send a political person to Kashmir after 51 years.” Later, it was proven that it wasn’t just a headline—it was a strategy.

Highly placed sources suggest that this political move was partly influenced by Governor Vohra himself. He reportedly cautioned Delhi: sending a man in uniform gives the wrong message in Kashmir, as till then the Prime Minister’s Office had zeroed in on a military face.

Kashmir, he argued, needed a civilian face—someone with political instinct, not just administrative experience. Even Dineshwar Sharma, then the Centre’s special interlocutor and a former IB chief, echoed the need for a more acceptable public figure. Ironically, Sharma himself was in the running.

The shortlist for Vohra’s successor included two retired Army generals and bureaucrats like Rajiv Mehrishi. But one by one, these names were crossed out.

Even Amolak Rathan Kohli, a BJP leader and former governor of Mizoram, believed he was a shoo-in. He hosted Kashmiri journalists in Delhi over a grand lunch. But in the end, it was Satya Pal Malik—soft-spoken, avuncular, politically seasoned—who was summoned to Srinagar.

From Aligarh to Raj Bhavan

Born in Meerut, Malik was a product of north India’s socialist churn. He began with Charan Singh’s Bharatiya Lok Dal, moved to the Janata Dal, V.P. Singh’s Jan Morcha, the Congress, and finally to the BJP, where he became national vice president.

He wasn’t a mass leader, but he was no stranger to negotiation and nuance. During V.P. Singh’s premiership, he served as Union Minister of State for Parliamentary Affairs and Tourism. His political background and Janata Dal roots made him familiar with leaders across the spectrum, including Mufti Mohammad Sayeed, with whom he shared a close rapport.

On his way to take charge in Srinagar, Malik met a group of journalists in Bihar Bhawan in New Delhi. He reminisced about his contacts with Kashmiri students studying at Aligarh Muslim University. He even asked after one of them by name—someone he hadn’t seen in decades. It was a rare glimpse into a man who seemed to be walking into Raj Bhavan not just with a briefcase, but a backstory.

Satya Pal Malik took charge in August 2018. A year later, on August 5, 2019, Article 370 was abrogated. Jammu and Kashmir lost its special status—and its statehood. The decision was made in Delhi, but its execution bore his signature.

On the night of August 4, as panic swirled in the Valley, Malik had gone on TV to reassure people: “There is no such plan.” A day later, he was handed a letter from Delhi that made him the constitutional face of India’s most controversial political manoeuvre in decades.

“I was not informed,” he later told Karan Thapar. “They didn’t need to. But had they asked me, I would have advised against making it a Union Territory. That was a mistake.”

This wasn’t just regret—it was rebellion.

Broken Fax Machine

Malik’s term in Kashmir will also be remembered for a farcical yet fateful incident—what came to be known as the "Faxgate."

On November 21, 2018, Mehbooba Mufti, backed by the Congress and the National Conference, claimed majority support to form government. She faxed a letter to the Governor’s office.

The Raj Bhavan said it never arrived.

Malik dissolved the Assembly that same evening, citing “horse-trading fears.” The excuse? “The fax machine wasn’t working.”

It was a holiday, he said. “There wasn’t even a cook in the house.”

Twitter exploded. Omar Abdullah posted a GIF of a fax machine shredding paper. Mehbooba Mufti tweeted a skeleton: “Meanwhile, those awaiting a response.” The event quickly became a metaphor for how institutions were being bypassed with bureaucratic absurdity.

Three months later, on February 14, 2019, a suicide bomber killed 40 CRPF personnel in Pulwama. The convoy had reportedly sought air transport but was denied.

In 2023, Malik dropped a political bombshell. In an interview with Thapar, he alleged that both PM Modi and NSA Ajit Doval asked him to keep quiet about lapses that led to the Pulwama attack. “I told the PM it was our failure,” he said. “He told me not to speak about it.”

That interview made him a pariah in Delhi’s corridors of power—but a cult figure elsewhere.

After J&K, Malik was sent to Goa and later Meghalaya. In both roles, he stayed true to form—quietly assertive, but quick to speak when he saw wrongdoing.

In Goa, he accused the BJP-led government of shielding corrupt builders and bureaucrats. He named names. He didn’t flinch. Shortly after, he was replaced.

By then, he had become a rarity: a governor who bit the hand that appointed him. He called PM Modi “ill-informed” on Kashmir. He said the Centre’s handling of corruption was a sham. He didn’t walk back his statements. He waited for consequences. None came.

Full-Circle Farewell

Satya Pal Malik died on August 5, 2025 — exactly six years after the day that redefined Jammu and Kashmir. It is a date now etched into the region’s political memory — a pivot around which history turned.

He was a man who played many roles: insider and dissenter, enabler and exposé, administrator and whistleblower. His tenure in Kashmir was as more about what he did as what he failed—or was not allowed—to prevent.

In the end, perhaps his greatest legacy lies in his contradictions. He stayed loyal to the Constitution, but not to the script. He followed orders, but not blindly. And when it mattered, he spoke—even when it cost him his place in the party’s pantheon.

Satya Pal Malik’s life was not just a footnote in Kashmir’s modern history. It was a chapter—flawed, complex, unfinished. That he departed on August 5 was no coincidence. It was punctuation. A full stop. Or perhaps, a final footnote in the fax machine of Indian democracy—sent, delivered, and now, signed off.