“Jammu and Kashmir government will construct Smriti Bhavan in memory of Martyrs of PoJK. Steps will be taken to regularize the colonies of displaced families. It is our responsibility to secure their rights and create an enabling environment to fulfill the aspirations of the youth,” tweeted Lieutenant Governor Manoj Sinha, tagging the PM Narendra Modi and Union Home Minister Amit Shah.
It may sound like a sudden decision, but it has taken a lot of hard work, working with volunteers from the youth of Pakistan Occupied Jammu Kashmir (PoJK) over the past few years. He organized dozens of camps in remote places for enumeration and registration of Displaced People (DP). Ajay Sharma said that at least 23,000 displaced persons living outside Jammu and Kashmir (J&K) have been issued domicile certificates after following due process.
Jammu and Kashmir government will construct Smriti Bhavan in the memory of martyrs of PoJK. Steps will be taken to regularize the colonies of displaced families. It is our responsibility to secure their rights and create an enabling environment to fulfill the aspirations of the youth.@narendramodi @AmitShah pic.twitter.com/3cFBmlFDaT– Office of the LG Jammu and Kashmir (@OfficeOfLGJandK) March 6, 2023
A few days ago, the Jammu and Kashmir government released an advertisement giving details about ‘LG’s Special Governance Camp for DPs of PoJK’. These camps will be organized from March 6 (Monday) to March 19 at various places. The focus will be on skill development, social support, self-employment, education, sports and financial inclusion.
According to official sources, these camps will be organized at Bhaur camp, Chatta, Satwari, Bakshi Nagar (both in Jammu), Rajouri, Poonch, Samba and two places at Udhampur. Advertisement detailing these programs has been issued by the Relief and Rehabilitation Department of the Government of Jammu and Kashmir.
‘able to walk’
Talking about the latest development, Dr Deepak Kapoor said: “The regularization of colonies of Smriti Bhavan and DP are enabling steps, and gives us a sense of empowerment.”
He said that a lot needs to be done to rectify the historical mistakes that DP faced in these 75 years.
“Twenty-four seats have been frozen (and reserved) for PoJK areas in the Legislative Assembly of Jammu and Kashmir. All, or most of these, can be defrosted. DPs living in J&K and all over India and even in other parts of the world can be included in the legislature of the Union Territory (UT) of J&K,” he argued.
Dr. Kapoor’s parents barely escaped with their lives as they fled Muzaffarabad when the communal killings started there. “Suitable modalities can be worked out. This can be done by nominating people from among the DPs, or any other method developed by the government. This will help the DP to become a part of the legislature and regain its lost identity.”
They say that Pakistan conducts regular elections for 12 seats (six reserved for Jammu region, 6 for Kashmir Valley) in PoJK areas. “Why can’t it be done here in Jammu and Kashmir?”
Then answering himself, he says that now this can happen provided the government shows political will.
When asked about the number of DPs from PoJK, he says that no census has been done by the government to count them. Although they claim that this number can be up to 10 lakh or even one million. He said that out of these, about 8.50 lakh DPs are living in various districts of Jammu region and the rest in other parts of India and some in foreign countries.
On 22 February, Kapoor made a presentation at the Department of Regional and Strategic Studies (DSRS), University of Jammu. His presentation details the horrors that befell his parents, grandparents and other DPs in October 1947. He then made a passionate request to the government to set up a Smriti Bhavan for the DPs of PoJK.
A massive rally was organized by DPs in Jammu city on 8th May, 2022 to pay homage to their forefathers who were martyred in October 1947. The event was attended by over 20,000 people, which was attended by Surinder Jain, a senior member of the Vishwa Hindu Parishad (VHP). The leader had spoken.
the issues
In late 1989 and early 1990, a large-scale militancy broke out in the Kashmir Valley. Later, bomb blasts, selective communal killings and display of weapons by terrorists in public places were witnessed across Jammu and Kashmir. On February 22, 1994, both houses of the Indian Parliament unanimously passed a resolution asserting that Jammu and Kashmir “is an integral part of India, and Pakistan must vacate the parts of the state it occupies”.
The resolution read: “This House expresses deep concern over Pakistan’s role in training terrorists in camps located in Pakistan and Pakistan Occupied Kashmir, supply of arms and funds, aiding infiltration of trained terrorists including foreign mercenaries into Jammu and Kashmir expresses.” It also called upon “Pakistan to end its support to terrorism, which is the “root cause of tension between the two countries”.
The resolution also declared that India has the will and ability to firmly counter all designs against its unity, sovereignty and territorial integrity. As of February 2019, the will and ability that Parliament talked about was rarely on display and sounded like empty rhetoric. However, the brutal killing of CRPF jawans on February 14, 2019 and the subsequent Balakot attacks changed that perception.
For the past four years, India-Pakistan relations have been witnessing a new dynamic, with the Indian government increasingly defining red lines. Incidentally, in the above paragraph, the term Pakistan Occupied Kashmir has been used, which was officially changed to Pakistan Occupied Jammu and Kashmir (POJK) by the Modi government in its first term.
The government has taken important steps, although these may have been less publicised. For starters, the government has recognized displaced people (refugees, in other words) from PoJKs as “stakeholders” in J&K, says Kapoor.
Last month, students from Central University of Jammu (CUJ) and some departments of Jammu University participated in the program held at Jammu University. It needs to be emphasized here that successive governments in J&K refused to recognize DPs of PoJKs from (then) outside the state as genuine residents of the state.
Something has changed now and an important role in this has been played by the descendants of DPs of PoJK settled in Delhi. They have been organizing small memorial ceremonies every year on 25 November to pay homage to the Hindu and Sikh martyrs of Mirpur. For several decades the center of their activities was the Lajpatnagar area, where the Mirpur Mandir Balidan Bhawan has been built. In November 1947 at least 25,000 Hindus and Sikhs from Muzaffarabad and other towns who had gathered at Mirpur were massacred over several days. Most of these people were trying to escape from Jammu via Rajouri when the disaster struck.
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