Omkar Dattatray
The recent migration of Kashmiri Pandits who have stayed back in Kashmir in their villages on the onset of terrorism in 1990 and afterwards & lived among their Muslim neighbors has raised and put a big question mark on the narrative of normalcy flouted and claimed by government. The harsh reality and fact is that the Kashmiri Pandits of Choudergund village of Shopian district were told by their Muslim neighbors that the situation is not favorable and conducive for their living in Kashmir as there is threat to their lives. The Kashmiri Muslims said that they are helpless to guarantee the safety and security of these KPs and so they should leave Kashmir. Thus the hapless, helpless and innocent Kashmiri Pandits decided to leave their homes and hearths and came to Jammu to save their life and honor as their life, limb and dignity was totally unsafe and insecure in Kashmir as the terrorists have in past few months killed many Kashmiri Pandits and other Hindu minorities. It is reported in the electronic media of Urdu that 13-14 families of Chourgund Kashmir have migrated from their ancestral village and they reached Jammu on the evening of 25th October. One of the migrated KP ladies said while taking and answering the media questioning that they were feeling very unsecure after the brutal and barbaric killing of their young neighbor Puran Krishan Bhat and ever since his murder by the terrorists they have remained confined to our homes and did not go out and thus were forced to migrate to Jammu. It is very sad that the innocent Kashmiri Pandit families from district Shopian decided to migrate despite their being in the valley during all these years of turmoil but know they have migrated to Jammu leaving behind their land and orchard and other immovable, movable properties. A Kashmiri Pandit who migrated on 25th of October while narrating their woes said that even police had told them to leave Kashmir as police said that they are helpless before terrorists and cannot protect them and so it is better if they migrate. Few thousand Kashmiri Pandits were living across Kashmir valley on the assurance and guarantee of the local Muslims but now the same Muslim neighbors have asked them to leave Kashmir as the situation is not feasible for their living in Kashmir. The fresh migration of 13 families will trigger more migration of the residual Pandits still living in Kashmir. The bitter truth is that the Kashmiri pundits are living in Kashmir under perpetual threat and risk to their lives and honor and they are no longer safe now as the terrorists are on the prowl of soft targets and the targeted killings are happening without any respite. How sad it is that after living all these 32 years of turmoil and terrorism in their native villages and tolerating the tough times in Kashmir, many KP’s have decided to migrate as the fear of gun and killing looms large across Kashmir. The government has miserably failed to curb terrorism and the innocent people both the Kashmiri Pandits and Kashmiri Muslims are killed by the armed terrorists under the direction of ISI of Pakistan. The attacks on Kashmiri Pandits and other innocent people as well as on the security forces are continuing without any respite. The Kashmiri Pandits are living in Kashmir under continuous threat to their life, limb, property and honor and many of them have now migrated to Jammu to save their life and dignity. The Kashmiri Pandits who had decided to live with their Muslim neighbors all through the thick and thin of their life have now deserted their landed properties and orchards and have migrated to Jammu because of threat perception and risk to their lives. The fresh migration has put a big question mark on the narrative of the BJP of everything is normal in Kashmir. If the situation will have been normal the Kashmiri Pandits would not have migrated after living in Kashmir for thirty two years of the violence and terrorism. The fresh migration of the residual Kashmiri Pandits has exposed the tall claims of normalcy in Kashmir. The fact is that nothing is well in Kashmir as for as the ground situation is concerned. The Kashmiris both Muslims as well as residual Pandits are living in Kashmir under threat, duress and fear and there is continuous threat and insecurity to the lives of both the Kashmiri Pandits and the Kashmiri Muslims. Day in and day out the Killings of innocent people is taking place and socking the land of Kashmir with innocent and precious human blood and the BJP dispensation and LG administration is not ashamed of calling and describing this volatile and grim situation in Kashmir as normal. One fails to understand as to what are the parameters of Government’s theory of normalcy. The leaders and the centre government ministers are shouting at the top of their voice that the situation has limped back to normalcy in Kashmir after the abrogation of controversial article 370 and 35-A of the constitution on August 5, 2019. The BJP leaders are claiming that situation will be normal in Kashmir after the scrapping of the article 370 but normalcy is seen nowhere across Kashmir as the innocent people belonging to various faiths are killed by the terrorists and fear psychosis continues in Kashmir without any respite. The fresh migration of many Kashmiri Pandit families from their Shopian village has punctured and exposed the normalcy balloon of BJP and there are no takers of the normalcy. The innocent people are maimed, tortured and killed by the radicalized youth under the guise of so called Jihad across Kashmir. The Killings of the innocent Kashmiri Pandits and other Hindu minorities is a stain and blot on the face of much valued Kashmiriyat and Hindu-Muslim brotherhood. The fresh migration of the Kashmiri Pandits from Chudergund village proves beyond doubt that the ground situation in Kashmir is very bad and not feasible and conducive for the living of Pandits in Kashmir and it is because of this fact that some Kashmiri Pandit families have migrated from Kashmir and have taken refuge in Jammu. In the coming days more KP families will migrate from their place of birth most involuntarily and against their will and wish but they will migrate to save their life and honor as they are on the radar of the terrorists. The fact is that the ground situation in Kashmir is not at all conducive for the living in Kashmir but it is great irony that the central leadership and the state leadership of the BJP is busy in claiming that the situation in Kashmir is normal and the terrorism is on its last leg. But the ground situation is far from being called normal as the innocent people both Hindus and Muslims are killed by the terrorists with sadistic pleasure and therefore the situation cannot be called normal by any stretch of imagination. It is disturbing that under the fear of gun Kashmiri Pandit Package employees are coerced to resume their duties across Kashmir, while the fact is that the situation is not feasible and conducive for their living and working across Kashmir. The LG government should stop to coerce the Package employees to resume their duties in Kashmir. It is very unfortunate and a human rights violation that the salaries of the Package employees have been stopped and these have not even been released on the auspicious occasion of Diwali. The government should without any delay order the release the salaries of the Package employees, besides conceding their genuine demand of shifting them to Jammu and attaching to RC office and its counters. Coming back to the main theme of this write up, it can unarguably be said that the situation is far from normal in Kashmir and it cannot become normal by parroting normalcy by the men at the helm of affairs through the electronic and print medium.
(The author is a columnist, social and KP activist).