Last year’s unrest haunts Durbar employees heading to Valley

Amit Khajuria

Tribune News Service

Jammu, April 25

With just three days left for the Durbar move, shifting of seat of the government from Jammu to Srinagar, the spectre of violence-filled Kashmir has come to haunt more than 6,000 Durbar employees.

Jammu employees, in particular, are scared as all of them have nightmarish memories of the 2016 Kashmir unrest following the killing of militant commander Burhan Wani. The government employees lived in fear of being stoned and intercepted all the time as the law and order machinery had failed to protect them.

The Durbar offices, including the civil secretariat, are closing down in Jammu on April 28 and will reopen in Srinagar on May 8.

Keeping in view the prevailing turbulent situation in the Kashmir valley, where stone-throwing and clashes have become a routine, a sense of insecurity has gripped the employees. The law and order authorities themselves are living under threat which is now more palpable after the police issued advisory to its personnel not to visit their homes because of the security concerns.

Nearly 6,000 employees of the civil secretariat and other departments will move to their Srinagar offices. A number of Kashmiri employees have shifted their children to Jammu and got them admitted to Jammu schools and colleges out of fear that the educational institutions in Kashmir may see a repeat of the 2016 unrest when the schools and colleges in the Valley remained shut for almost five months.

With the fresh spate of violence, particularly involving students across the Valley, their fears have deepened.

A secretariat employee said, “We have been the real victim of the Kashmir violence for the past many years, but our government has never cared about the sentiments and safety of the Jammu-based employees in Kashmir. At the time of the Amarnath land row in 2008, they forced us to be in our offices despite curfew and serious threat to our lives. So was the case in 2010 and last year.”

“Our previous experiences in Kashmir during unrest have been horrible, causing a sense of insecurity in us and our families as well,” another employee said.

These employees are housed in unsafe places. There is no provision of security for them there. Only the officers and higher-ups live in secured zones. Other employees live at places which can be targeted easily by stone-throwers.

During curfew, the Jammu employees are left with no provision of food and other facilities at their hotels.

“Our families are feeling as though we are going to war and they are not sure of our safe return,” said another secretariat employee hailing from Jammu.

“Last year at the time of unrest, our families were also stuck in Kashmir with us. They have faced the actual situation and now when we are again preparing to shift to Kashmir, it is raising their worries,” he added.

Employeespeak

• We have been the real victim of the Kashmir unrest for the past many years, but our government never cared about the sentiments and safety of the Jammu-based employees in Kashmir. At the time of the Amarnath land row in 2008, they forced us to be in our offices despite curfew and a serious threat to our lives. So was the case in 2010 and last year.
• Our families are feeling as though we are going to war; they are not sure of our safe return. Last year at the time of unrest, our families were also stuck in Kashmir with us.