Sir,
The Government of India has been toying with various proposals, intermittently, for the last twenty five years, regarding the rehabilitation of Kashmiri Pandits in the Valley with the oft repeated cliche- honour and dignity.’ Now, with the present NDA Govt at the top, seemingly serious efforts are afoot for sending and settling the Pandits of Kashmir back in the native palace of their birth, with honour and dignity. A realisation has dawned on the authorities that a dignified way of life for the Kashmiri Pandits is possible only when they are resettled in a separate area in Kashmir, away from the harms way.
This being as it is, the Hurriyat conglomerate, has not taken favourably this mode of rehabilitating KPs. This has happened on expected lines. The Hurriyat leaders have, always in the past, fought against this way of rehabilitation, tooth and nail, for reasons not known only to them but also to the KPs, as well as the right thinking people and the watchers of Kashmir imbroglio here and elsewhere. The fact of the matter is that they don’t want to allow any foot prints of Indianness to appear on the soil of Kashmir again.
Now these leaders ask, rather in a vein of hypocrisy, and only for public consumption, why these Kashmiri Pandits should want to live separately when the whole valley is their home. These people conscious of the fact that the Pandits of Kashmir will, never-ever, with their burnt fingers, agree to live in Kashmir on a pre-exodus pattern, scattered here and there, because the socio-political environment is the dangerous for them. Anti India and anti-Hindus venom has vitiated the valleys atmosphere all these years- the venom of hate generated by the Islamist propaganda machine.
As of now, the Pandits find themselves caught up in the proverbial position of standing between the deep sea and the devil. Living with the general public as of yore, is not at all safe, and the alternative root of settlement is blocked by the Hurriyat that has threatened a violent agitation in case of this settlement in a concentrated manner.
Where are the Pandits to go in this murky atmosphere of continued attrition between the two forces, one in favour of separate settlement, while the other speaking daggers on the subject. How long will the KPs remain tossing and oscillating between hope and despair. How long!.
The dream of homeplace seems to be receding into a mental mirage. It is there and yet not there.
Yours etc….
Prof M L Raina
Janipur
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