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| Not one lakh, but 3.5 lakh Kashmiri Hindus stand disenfranchised | | Civic polls | |
Early Times Report
jammu, Sept 18: The internally-displaced Kashmiri Hindus are up in arms. They have threatened that they could boycott the upcoming Urban Local Bodies and Panchayat elections in case they were not allowed to exercise their franchise like they exercised this right in 2005 during the civic polls.
Two weeks ago, the aggrieved Kashmiri Hindus had claimed that names of over 1 lakh internally-displaced Kashmiri Hindus living in Jammu since 1990 had been deleted from the voters list and they had termed this deletion as "constitutional lynching". However, on Monday, their leaders claimed that not one lakh, but names of 3.5 lakh internally-displaced Kashmiri Hindus living in different parts of India, including Jammu, Udhampur, Bombay, Pune, Delhi, Bangalore and Chandigarh have been deleted. "3.5 lakh Kashmiri Hindus living across the nation since their exodus in 1990 have been disenfranchised," they claimed. They threatened that they might boycott the scheduled polls if they were not allowed to exercise their franchise in the manner they were allowed in 2005 during the PDP-Congress regime.
They have denounced the BJP all the more saying that they were disenfranchised at a time when "the BJP was at the helm of affairs in New Delhi and sharing power with the PDP in the state". "The BJP has let us down; the BJP is responsible for what the authorities in the government did to disenfranchise them".
"It's sad that in 1990, we were thrown out of Kashmir and 29 years later, we are being disenfranchised. This is nothing but apartheid," said Ajay Chrungoo, chairman of Panun Kashmir, frontline organization of internally-displaced Kashmiri Hindus. Another senior Kashmiri Hindu leader and Convener of the Panun Kashmir Agnishekhar said that the "decision to delete the names of Kashmiri Hindus living in Jammu since 1990 from the voters list was another attempt to further marginalize the Kashmiri Hindu community" and added that the "policy of appeasement would further damage the nation in Kashmir". He demanded "restoration of 2005 system".
It would be only in the interest of democracy if J&K Governor intervened in the matter and do something concrete so that the internally-displaced Kashmiri Hindus were considered part and parcel of the state polity and exercised their right to vote in the civic elections. This has become all the more imperative considering the fact that the Kashmir-based parties like the NC, the PDP, the CPI-M have already announced poll boycott. |
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