KANGRA, Aug 6:
In the aftermath of abrogation of Articles 370 and 35 A in Jammu and Kashmir, allowing non-Kashmiri residents to purchase land in the Valley, the Kashmiri Pandit migrants, apart from non-agriculturist residents of this hill state, have also raised demand of scrapping of Section 118 of the HP Tenancy and Land Reforms Act 1972, so that they can purchase land here.
Ashok Bahl, a retired senior Forest officer and resident of Jayanti Vihar, said that he was born in 1951 in Himachal and his family was living here for hundreds of years, but they can’t purchase land here, because of Section 118 of the HP Tenancy and Land Reforms Act of 1972, which permits only Himachal agriculturists to purchase land in this hill state.
He said that if someone sells his agricultural land and becomes landless, then also, he cannot purchase land back in the State, adding that it was more stringent than Article 370 and 35 A, which the Narendra Modi Government had scrapped.
According to Mr Bahl, on September 24, 2016, a two-judge bench of the HP High Court, comprising Justices Rajiv Sharma and Sureshwar Thakur, had directed the state to amend rules under Section 118 of the HP Tenancy and Land Reforms Act of 1972 within 90 days, so that people living in HP can purchase land in this hill state.
The State Government moved the Supreme Court, against the Judgement.
A Kashmiri migrant woman Jaya (62), said that she had been suffering for the last more than a decade now and moving from pillar to post, seeking permission from the state government under this Section.
The state government conceded that her files were un-traced in the offices of both the Revenue Secretary and the Deputy Commissioner of Kangra and she has been asked to apply afresh, which she can’t do with the amended rules, Mr Bahl noted.
Pinning her hope on Prime Minister Narendra Modi, Jaya, wife of Autar Krishen, who had migrated from Sopore in Kashmir valley to Kangra in 1990, following the terrorist holocaust, had written a letter to him for his intervention on July 12, 2018, but did not receive any response from the PMO, even after the lapse of more than one year.
She said that she had lost everything in Kashmir for the ‘Rashtriyata and Hindutva,’ but was struggling at the fag end of her life.
Both Mr Bahl and Ms Jaya stressed on the Prime Minister and Home Minister Amit Shah, to move and scrap Section 118 in the public and national interest, on the patterns of Articles 370 and 35 A. (UNI)
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