Shadi Lal Pandita, president of Jagti tenement committee urged the LG and Centre to look into the matter keenly and take necessary action to remove illegal encroachments and restore these properties to their owners
Internally displaced Kashmiri Pandits, who live in Jagti satellite township in Jammu district on Monday urged the government to initiate some measures for their rehabilitation in Kashmir.
Addressing media persons, Shadi Lal Pandita, president of Jagti tenement committee and Soan Kashmir Front said, “For the past, over 34 years, Kashmiri Pandits are living like refugees in their own country. We ask the government to initiate some measures in right earnest for our rehabilitation in our motherland–Kashmir.”
Claiming that the community was facing an identity crisis, Pandita said, “We should be rehabilitated in Kashmir and our losses of land, properties, orchards and temples be compensated. The properties of Pandits have been encroached upon by the government and semi-government departments in Valley. We demand that our lands and properties be vacated with immediate effect.”
He urged the LG and Centre to look into the matter keenly and take necessary action to remove illegal encroachments and restore these properties to their owners.
He also demanded five assembly seats and two parliamentary seats for the political empowerment of the community. “However, we urge the government that the representatives should be elected and not nominated from the community,” he added.
Pandita also demanded compensation to those Pandits, whose houses were torched post 1990 in Kashmir.
He also accused the relief and rehabilitation department of harassing the dwellers in Jagti township. “A total of 4,224 flats were constructed at Jagti satellite township by the UPA government and allotted to the migrants in 2010. Now, after more than 13 years, the allottees are being harassed by the relief organisation by sealing their quarters without severing any notice or any information. They have also stopped meagre cash assistance to the relief holders and have denied ration slips to the families, who are working outside J&K for their livelihood,” he said.
“We urge the LG to take stern action against the authorities concerned in this matter,” he said.
He also urged the LG to hike cash relief to the Kashmiri migrants ₹13,000 per family to ₹ 25,000 in view of rising inflation.
