 |
||
|
||
| Advertise with us! |
|
|
Despite the offer of protection from the Jammu and Kashmir chief
minister, Dr Farooq Abdullah, Hindu government employees, who fled
the insurgency in the Kashmir Valley, have said they would defy
orders to rejoin their earlier posts till peace is fully restored.
[Agencies report that Amanullah Khan, chairman of the
pro-independence Kashmiri militant outfit, Jammu Kashmir Liberation
Front (JK-LF), today warned Pakistan against befriending India at
the cost of the Kashmiris' right of self-determination.]
Kashmiri Hindu employees said Dr Abdullah's warning to them to
either report for work or quit was "inhuman", adding the state
government should first create conditions that would enable them to
return.
"The government should first make the Valley trouble-free "before
forcibly herding employees -or other migrants there," said Mr M.L.
Kaul, senior leader of the All-India Kashmiri Pandit Conference
(AIKPC), a frontline organisation of Kashmiri Hindus in the state.
The chief minister recently declared at a Jammu press conference
that all the displaced employees would have to return to the
Valley.
"Either they report to their duties in the Valley or they go-(from
government service)," Mr Abdullah said, adding the state government
would soon issue orders to this effect.
State government officials in Jammu said more than 25,000 Kashmiri
Hindus, living in Jammu for the past seven years, were drawing
salaries and other ,benefits as employees of the state government
without working.
Dr Abdullah said: "If others can work (in the Valley), why not
them. The government will provide them security and adequate
financial assistance to rebuild their damaged or burnt houses."
The chief minister's announcement also triggered a debate in the
state over whether he would .succeed in getting Hindus back to the
Valley, especially after ,renewed threats by the militants.
Mr Rakesh Dhar, a teacher who was forced to flee the Valley seven
years ago when militants served notice on Hindus to leave, dreads
the thought of returning.
"My house was burnt. All MY relatives and friends are here.
Someone else has been appointed in my post there (in the Valley).
if I rejoin duty, the displaced natives will be after my blood and
'what is the guarantee that militants will not hound us again?" Mr
Dhar said, adding that he ,would "prefer to beg on the streets here
than go back to a life of horror there".
Kashmiri Hindus began leaving the Valley from late 1989 when the
separatist movement turned violent.
India Abroad News Service
|
||
|
||
| Advertise with us! |
|
|