Excelsior Correspondent
NEW DELHI, Apr 14: Expressing concern over the raging controversy on the issue of the return of displaced Kashmiri Pandit community to the Valley, Union Minister of State (Independent Charge) of the Ministry of Development of North-Eastern Region (DoNER), MoS PMO, Personnel, Public Grievances ,Pensions, Atomic Energy and Space, Dr Jitendra Singh said here today that the displaced Kashmiri Pandit community deserves sympathetic, human approach and cautioned against any temptation to seek political mileage out of the issue.
“It is an irony that a controversy is sought to be created by some of those who always quoted Vajpayee’s “Insaniyat Ke Daire Mein” reference to Kashmir but refuse to view the issue of Kashmiri Pandits within the same “Insaniyat Ke Daire Mein”, he added.
Dr Jitendra said, not only this is a Constitutional right of Kashmiri Pandit community to return to their place of origin, but it is also the responsibility of the entire society to ensure their return with dignity and safety. “Any resistance to their return on any account is a violation of the spirit of democracy and also violation of the Constitution, under the oath of which the people’s elected representatives function”, he asserted.
Dr Jitendra said, he is particularly hurt to hear the opinion in certain quarters that the Kashmiri Pandits do not wish to return to their homes and that they left the Valley voluntarily by their own will. History bears out, he said, that however much of comfort is provided to a person living as a refugee in a state of homelessness, the person would still always yearn for return to his home and hearth.
Dr Jitendra said, those who threaten to protest against the plans for the return of Kashmiri Pandits or tend to lay down conditions for their return, should bear in mind that the same Constitutional frame which enables them to express themselves against the cause of Kashmiri Pandits, is also available to the members of the Kashmiri Pandit community to protest in support of their own cause.
The issue, therefore, can be resolved only through a sane realization that the Kashmiri Pandits are an essential component of Kashmir’s traditional culture and the lost glory of Kashmir cannot be restored without the return of Kashmiri Pandits, he added.
At the same time, Dr Jitendra also called for an equally sensitive approach in handling the cause of the other groups of refugees in Jammu & Kashmir, who include the refugees from Pak-occupied Jammu & Kashmir (PoJK) and those from erstwhile West Pakistan who are yet to receive their citizenship rights.
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