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Centre to
promote Kashmir as winter Plan to
redraw Indo-Pak border Magotra
gets akademi award for Dogri poetry Madhu Magotra sits beside the photograph of her late husband, Ashwani Magotra, who on Thursday was awarded by the Sahitya Akademi for his collection of Dogri poems.
— Tribune photo by Sarabjeet Singh |
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Centre to promote Kashmir as winter
Gulmarg, December 26 With the Centre agreeing to promote Kashmir to international tourists as a ‘world winter destination’, the state is poised for another phase of tourist inflow, Mr Sayeed told tour operators from different parts of the country and mediapersons here yesterday. For this, a core group of travel agents would be set up with Joint Secretary-cum-Managing Director of the ITDC with in Union Ministry of Tourism Amitab Kant as the Coordinator, he said. This group will meet on a fortnight basis to monitor the ongoing efforts on organising tourist groups to Jammu and Kashmir. He said the government would formulate a strategy to motivate international tour operators for organising tours to Kashmir, which was as safe as any other destination in the world. The Chief Minister said that during his recent visit to London he had spoken to Members of Parliament belonging to all parties about withdrawing the adverse travel advisories on the visit of their nationals to Kashmir. The Chief Minister referred to a detailed interaction he had with a group of 60 tour operators from various metropolitan cities, who were invited to celebrate the successful year of tourism and said the government had taken note of some of their useful suggestions to give further fillip to tourism in Jammu and Kashmir. Referring to another decision taken with tour operators during interaction, the Chief Minister said tours would be organised of groups of school children from all over the country to the state. He said efforts would be made to approach reputed educational institutions all over the country and organise their students’ tours to different destinations in the state. The Chief Minister said tourism had contributed greatly towards restoring normalcy in the state. “Tourism has come to be our biggest confidence building measure for the state”. Speaking on the occasion, Mr Kant said the Central Government was already implementing Rs 30 crore package for promotion of tourism in the state. He said the government had also sanctioned Rs 7.20 crore for completion of building complex of Indian Institute of Skiing and Mountaineering at Gulmarg.
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Plan to redraw Indo-Pak border Jammu, December 26 According to official
sources, under the proposed plan, Machel, Keran and Gurez were to be incorporated into Pakistan-occupied Kashmir, thereby enabling Islamabad to have something out of the deal. The sources said the plan also envisaged internal autonomy to the extent of self rule in the Kashmir valley, autonomous hill councils for Poonch, Rajouri and Doda districts and Union Territory-status for Ladakh region. The Hindu-dominated belts of Jammu, Kathua and Udhampur districts will remain with India according to the plan. Pakistan-occupied Kashmir will have a fully autonomous government and only its sovereignty will be in the hands of Islamabad as Jammu and Kashmir’s sovereignty will remain in the hands of Delhi. The arrangement, if materialised, will be followed by the demilitarisation of the areas on either side of the LoC after the border plan is redrawn. The sources said this proposal and other plans would come up for discussion after the Srinagar-Muzaffarabad road is thrown open for traffic and additional confidence-building measures are undertaken by Delhi and Islamabad. According to the sources, India will reduce its troops’ deployment on the 19,000 feet high Siachen mountain glacier, where the armies of both countries have remained engaged in intermittent but fierce exchange of fire since 1984, as per the plan. The border adjustment plan and other proposals will be debated only after Delhi is convinced that Islamabad has stopped aiding cross-border terrorism, the sources said. While the entire exercise aimed at resolving the Kashmir issue, has the support of US agencies Delhi, it may engage Kashmiri separatists in a purposeful dialogue. |
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Magotra
gets akademi award for Dogri poetry Jammu, December 26 Incidentally the award was announced on the same day when Parliament passed the Bill for including the Dogri language in the 8th Schedule of the Constitution on Thursday. Ms Magotra, who belongs to Amritsar and shoulders the responsibility of the upbringing of her two children, was virtually starved following the death of Ashwani Magotra three years ago. She is running the kitchen by sewing clothes of people. She had to withdraw her daughter, Pooja, from the school because she was unable to bear the cost of further studies. She somehow managed to continue the education of her son, Ankush, who is studying commerce in the college. She said she wanted her son to leave the college and take up some job so that he could earn some money for the family. The book, which has received the award, was published by the Dogri Sansatha after the death of Ashwani Magotra as he did not have a single penny to spare for getting his works printed. With Lalit Mangotra as convenor, Dharam Chandra Prashant, Ved Rahi and Yash Sharma, were on the panel for selecting the best book for the award. An unassuming Ashwani Magotra was compositor in a local printing press but because of the poverty he could not afford to get his works printed. He has to his credit collection of Dogri short stories, gazals and poetry. Madhu Magotra and Ankush said it would have been a big day for the family, had the award been announced during his lifetime. She could not believe that her husband has received recognition of the top most literary organisation of the country when Mr Jitender Udhampuri, station director of the local station of AIR, came to their home for giving this information. Thereafter, Shivdevi, mother of Lalit Mangotra, who is president of the Dogri Sanstha, informed her of the announcement. |
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Jammu,
December 26
