Vulnerable Pandit camps in Kashmir yet to be relocated

Sumit Hakhoo

Tribune News Service

Jammu, April 22

Despite repeated assurances by Chief Minister Mehbooba Mufti, the administration is yet to start the process of relocating two transit camps housing Kashmiri Pandit employees in the Valley.

The camps with prefabricated huts in Haal (Pulwama) and Nutnusa (Kupwara) were repeatedly attacked by stone throwers after the killing of Hizbul Mujahideen militant Burhan Wani in 2016. A majority of the employees who volunteered to return back to their homeland in 2010 under the Prime Minister’s Employment Package, announced by then Congress-led UPA government in 2008, left the camps after the violence. Out of 70 families who once resided in Haal, only 20 have returned to camp but continue to feel unsafe because of the deteriorating situation in the Valley. The rest are living in rented accommodation in Srinagar.

Nearly 150 employees living in Nutnusa faced the wrath of rioters in 2016. Their camp was extensively damaged by violent mobs, forcing them to shift to Jammu. Senior officials in the Relief Department also admit that the two camps are vulnerable to attacks from stone throwers.

“Two years have passed but no step has been taken to shift the camps. We have faced stone throwers since 2012. We used to ignore the incidents but after the 2016 violence, it has become impossible to live there,” said a Kashmiri Pandit who now resides in a rented accommodation in Srinagar.

He commutes daily to Pulwama, where he is posted. “Things will not look up for us if the government fails to make alternative arrangements for our stay,” said his wife, who is a teacher posted in the volatile south Kashmir district of Shopian. The couple refused to reveal their identities due to security reasons.

“We shifted to Jammu for eight months and rejoined duty in April 2017. Since then, the camp has not been attacked but the situation and relations in the Valley change like the weather,” said a teacher working in Kupwara.

Minister for Relief and Rehabilitation Javed Mustafa Mir at a meeting on Wednesday with a delegation of displaced Kashmiri Pandits again assured them that directions had been passed to the Divisional Commissioner (Kashmir) for immediate relocation of the transit camps.

“Apart from the general problems faced by the displaced people, we raised the issue of the relocation of camps. The minister again directed the Divisional Commissioner to speed up the process. Let us hope things get done this time,” said RK Bhat, president of the Youth All India Kashmiri Samaj (YAIKS).About 2,000 Pandit youth had returned to the Valley in 2010 under the Central employment package, a component of the Rs 1,618-crore package announced in 2008 by then Prime Minister Manmohan Singh. Its aim was to allow displaced Hindus to resettle and start life afresh in their homeland.

Constructed in 2004 

• Transit camps were constructed in 2004-05 during the then PDP-Congress government headed by Chief Minister Mufti Mohamamd Sayeed
• There are four transit camps in the Valley: Haal (Pulwama), Nutnusa (Kupwara), Sheikhpora (Budgam) and Veervan (Baramulla)
• Nearly 700 Pandit government employees engaged under the PM package were living in these transit camps. Nearly 2,200 Pandit youth had returned to the Valley under the package in 2010