Rarely is a bill retrieved from the Select Committee. Henceforth that will be the fate of the Bill for Hindu Shrines and Temples in the Valley. This is a subtle way of obliging the invisible opponents of the bill as well as disarming the vociferous displaced community from the valley. It has exposed real intentions of the MLAs and Ministers, who, in their drawing rooms and parlours, heartily assured the delegations of the stakeholders of their outright support to the bill. The Government found no lacunae in the bill for four long years of its pendency, At the last moment of the last day of the session, they did the unholy act of dealing a stroke at the roots of Kashmir’s composite culture. Deferment of the bill raises questions. The bill has been drafted strictly along the lines of Awqaf and Gurudwara Prabandhak bills. Where are the lacunae? As far as the question of trusteeship of some of the shrines is concerned, it has been negated in the case of Mata Vaishno Devi and Shri Amarnath Shrines. Moreover, with the replacement of autocracy by popular regime in the State in 1947, all assets including Trusts have lapsed into the custody of original stakeholders with the freedom of managing their functioning. Indefinite deferment of the bill will only enable the land mafia to wipe out depleted traces of shrine properties.
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