State Times News
JAMMU: Marking 26 years of their exile, displaced Kashmiri Pandits today said that apart from facing “Islamic terrorism”, the community has also been a victim of the “administrative terrorism”, which they alleged has delayed their rehabilitation in Kashmir.
“We were hounded out of our houses when the Islamic terrorism started in the Kashmir Valley, but in the past 26 years we have become victims of the administrative terrorism,” national spokesman of All Party Migrant Coordination Committee King Bharti said. “Neither the state nor the central government showed seriousness towards our rehabilitation. In the past 26 years, nobody came forward with a way,” Bharti said.
He said the two major concerns of the community, including employment for the educated youth, and the return and rehabilitation of the community, remained unfulfilled.
Stressing on the security aspect, Bharti said, “You can guard our houses, colonies…but it’s not possible to provide security to each and every Kashmiri Pandit when they go out in the market. Security is the most important aspect connected to the return of the community.”
Due to lack of employment opportunities for the educated KP youths who have been putting up in various migrant camps across the Jammu region, drug abuse and psychological disorders have become rampant.
KPs also demand that the Internal Displaced Persons (IDP) status, as recommended by several parliamentary committees on home affairs, should be granted to the community. Panun Kashmir spokesman Virender Raina said the community has the first and natural right over the territory of Kashmir and would return only when its geo-political aspirations as per Margdarshan resolution are fulfilled through political and constitutional means.
Despite the recommendations made by a number of parliamentary standing committees on home affairs regarding the grant of Internally Displaced Persons status to the KP community, nothing concrete has been done till date, he alleged.
“We demand that the IDP status as recommended by the parliamentary committees be granted to the community living in exile for the last 26 years,” he added.
Panun Kashmir President Ashwani Kumar Chrungoo, who led a protest outside the Raj Bhawan here to mark the 26th anniversary of the ‘Holocaust Day’, said: “The Kashmiri Pandit community was made the selected victim of terror and terrorism, murder and mayhem on a large scale resulting in their mass exodus from the valley.
“Genocide against the community was used as a strong weapon to achieve ethnic cleansing by the fundamentalists and terrorists in the Kashmir Valley.”
He said those who forget the history are condemned to live live it again and that is why that the leadership of the community has to stay on guard against any “hasty” move regarding the settlement of Kashmiri Pandits in Kashmir. “The diatribe against the Pandit community by the separatist forces in Kashmir remains unabated despite complete banishment of the Pandits in Kashmir.
“It is the secessionist and terrorist forces who were responsible for the genocide and ethnic cleansing of Kashmiri Pandits,” Chrungoo said.
