New Delhi: The People’s Democratic Party (PDP) patron Mufti Mohammad Sayeed Friday called on Prime Minister Narendra Modi ahead of taking an oath as the new chief minister of Jammu and Kashmir on Sunday.

Mufti’s PDP and Modi’s Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) had on Tuesday announced their decision to join hands and form a coalition government in India’s northern most state two months after the state delivered a fractured mandate. It would be the first time that a pro-Hindu party would be part of a government in India’s only Muslim majority state.

Mufti is supposed to have invited Modi to his swearing-in ceremony. Sources in the BJP said Modi has accepted the invitation and would be present at the ceremony.

BJP’s Nirmal Singh is expected to be sworn-in as deputy chief minister while the two parties will share six cabinet berths each in the new government.

The two leaders discussed the common minimum programme or agenda for governance, which was painstakingly worked out over negotiations that lasted two months. While PDP leader Haseeb Drabu was the chief negotiator on behalf of his party, BJP general secretary Ram Madhav represented his party.

Mufti admitted after meeting Modi at his 7 Racecourse Road residence that it was a meeting between the north and south poles.

“It was a war of nerves,” Mufti said about reconciliation between two ideologically opposite parties, but added that a common ground had been found as both the parties were flexible during negotiations.

While BJP conceded PDP’s demand that status quo would be maintained over Article 370 of the Indian constitution that gives Jammu and Kashmir status of a special state within Union of India, PDP agreed to drop its demand for repelling of AFSPA (armed forces special protection act) that allows army to arrest anyone without warrant in the sensitive state. The two parties had agreed that the state police and paramilitary forces would replace the army in areas where normality had returned in the strife-torn state.

Mufti is believed to have taken up his demand for resumption of dialogue with Pakistan and inviting separatist Hurriyat Conference leaders for talks to ensure return of normality in the state.

Mufti termed the opportunity of engaging Islamabad into dialogue process as historic and insisted that the Modi government must take off from where the previous BJP government headed by Atal Bihari Vajpayee had left it.

“History has given us another chance. We want to repeat history,” Mufti, a former Jammu and Kashmir chief minister, who has worked as the federal home minister in the past, said after meeting Modi. He added that the new PDP-BJP government would strive to give a ‘healing touch’ to the state.

BJP is expected to offer former separatist leader Sajjad Lone, who returned to the mainstream politics and contested his first elections in December assembly polls, from its quota of ministers. Lone’s People’s Conference had won two seats in the 87-member assembly while PDP and BJP won 28 and 25 seats respectively.

BJP had earlier agreed that it would not insist on sharing the chief minister’s post on rotation basis and would let Mufti function as the chief minister for the entire six-year tenure of the new government.

The two parties have also agreed to share the post of assembly speaker and chairman of the legislative council between them.