Excelsior Correspondent
ANANTNAG, Nov 7: CPI (M) leader and former MLA Mohd Yousuf Tarigami today said that taking over of even marriage halls by the CRPF in Srinagar and coming of new security bunkers across the Valley has punctured the BJP Government’s ‘normalcy’ claims in Jammu and Kashmir after the unconstitutional abrogation of the erstwhile state’s special status under Article 370.
While addressing party workers in South Kashmir’s Kund area of Qazigund, he said security bunkers are coming up at every nook and corner of Srinagar and new paramilitary companies have been called in Kashmir. The situation has reached a stage where additional CRPF personnel are being stationed in marriage halls which is the only private space left for people here.
BJP’s fake narrative about “progress and development” in J&K post August 5, 2019 gets trashed by such incidents. Every day more draconian laws are brought in with the sole purpose of suffocating people into silence.
The only progress that has been made in the last three years is creation of more tools of repression. J&K has been made a model police state with no redressal mechanism or constitutional institution. The highest unemployment rate of 21.6 percent and staggering inflation rate of 7.39 percent in J&K belies the claims of the BJP’s “growth and development” in the region post 2019.
J&K is a political issue and needs a political outreach and not additional forces, more draconian laws and repression. When the already available forces and draconian laws could not control the situation how can additional forces and new draconian laws do?
He said that ever since August 2019, the incomes of people in J&K associated with the informal sector, consisting of low wage workers have dwindled sharply due to a major unemployment wave. Some of the severely affected people include construction workers, auto and bus drivers, small shop owners and daily wage labourers. ASHA and Anganwari workers are not being paid their meager wages on time in J&K.
The fruit industry in Kashmir faced economic consequences due to the August 2019 lockdown which followed by Covid-19 lockdowns wreaking havoc on the fruit industry. This year also early snowfall in October dealt another blow to the farmers, especially in South Kashmir’s Kulgam and Shopian districts. Fruit was damaged due to the snowfall, but it caused damage to fruit trees as well which will be difficult for farmers to compensate for. He called for adequate compensation to these affected orchardists.
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