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| Jammu deserves special attention, treatment | | Ending Kashmiri domination | | Early Times Report
JAMMU, Mar 12: The princely State of Jammu & Kashmir acceded to India on October 26, 1947. Ever since then, the people of Jammu and Ladakh have been receiving shoddy treatment from the Kashmir-centric Valley's ruling class. The reason is that Jawaharlal Nehru not only complicated the whole issue of Jammu & Kashmir by making Kashmiri separatist and NC leader Sheikh Abdullah, who was known for his hatred for Jammu and the Jammu Dogras, a party to the state's accession but also by transferring the state power from Jammu to Srinagar. Sheikh Abdullah had no locus standi in the matter but Nehru, who didn't like Maharaja Hari Singh, made him a party to complicate the matters for the nation in the state and render the people of Jammu and Ladakh unreal and ineffective for all practical purposes. Jammu had ruled the state between March 1846 and October 1947 and handed down a system of governance that didn't discriminate between the regions and the communities they housed.
Now that a new coalition government of which the BJP, which swept the assembly elections in Jammu province by winning 25 out of 37 seats, is one of the two equally important constituents, it is generally believed that it would reverse the 67-year-old policies and address the issues facing the people of Jammu and Ladakh. One, it must respect the promises made to those families who migrated from Pakistan-occupied Jammu & Kashmir and West Pakistan to various parts of Jammu province in the wake of the communal partition of India and wars of 1947, 1965 and 1971. They have been facing various kinds of problems as the successive Kashmiri-dominated governments in the state never gave them the status they rightfully deserved. They are designated as migrants/displaced persons/refugees and their number is no less than 15 lakh.
As for the refugees from West Pakistan, their life is highly miserable; they have been living as non-state subjects in Jammu province, especially in its Kathua, Samba and Jammu districts. They have not been given citizenship rights. They must be given permanent resident status and told that the new government would take care of their sustenance and livelihood. Besides the citizens of the state who have been living along the international border and the Line of Control should be treated equally as they face identical problems. Not just this, the new government must also properly rehabilitate those Jammu migrants who were forced to quit their homes and hearths from 1999 onwards and who are leading a pathetic life in Talwara.
The BJP would also do well to ensure that a delimitation commission is appointed at the earliest so that the assembly constituencies are delimited strictly in accordance with the criteria laid down by the Representation of People's Act - land area, nature of terrain, accessibility and population. All the political parties in the state, including the Congress, the NC and the CPI, have been opposing delimitation of the assembly constituencies after the census 2001. In fact, the NC government in February 2002 banned delimitation of the constituencies by amending the constitution to scuttle the age-old demand in Jammu for a proper representation in the assembly.
It is hoped that the state government would live up to the expectations of the people of Jammu and Ladakh and redress the past wrongs. It cannot afford to treat them in the manner the earlier dispensations treated them after 1947, as the continuation of the old policies would surely strengthen the hands of those who have been working for the state's trifurcation. |
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