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| 2019 – Painful for Jammu and Kashmir | | | Mahadeep Singh Jamwal
The 12 o’clock at night, December 31, 2019, will advance us to New Year 2020, wishing us all the best, with wrap up of synchronized events inked on the pages of the year 2019. Very few pages scripted and printed with events of proud moments, few with criticism of the functioning of Constitutional authorities, some with unhappy anecdote in political chapters, and rest with horrendous moments of pain bleeding the J&K. Every time when we will tear a leaf off a calendar of 2019, it will present a new blend of admixture of grace and sorrowful events. The advancement of the year 2019, brought havoc on Central Reserve Police Force (CRPF), when its 40 personnel were blown by a Jaish-e-Mohammad (JeM) suicide bomber in Pulwama. Retaliatory move followed air strikes in Balakote. It was taken by many as turning point for Modi to win the 2019 elections. Year 2019 will be remembered for Government created panic on the pretext of inputs of possible attack on Amarnath yatris thereby Amarnath yatra was suspended, tourists were evacuated forcibly from valley, and students studying in valley were forced to leave the state as well as laborers from outside were pushed back from valley. This was a trickery of the government and false propagation on the analogy of the Hindi Idiom ‘ Kahin Pe Nigahein, Kahien Pe Nishana’ whereas the actual agenda was a hidden one and that was abrogation of Article 370 and downgrading the Jammu and Kashmir State, a political game plan. The populaces as well as voted Parliamentarians of J&K were kept in dark. 2019 realized the people of Jammu Kashmir that ‘Jis Ki Lathi Uski Bhains’. Year 2019 will be remembered for the abrogation of Article 370 in Jammu and Kashmir and for downgrading the status of the State splitting it into two Union Territories i.e. Jammu & Kashmir and Ladakh by legislation ‘The Jammu & Kashmir Reorganisation Act’. 2019 will be remembered in J&K as platter for the present dispensation for flexing its muscle with two intentions: one that it has courage to hammer those matters which are sub judice in the Apex Court and second to divert the attention of the nation from those accusing fingers that points towards its failure and other burning issues. Subsequently the year 2019 saw strangulation of the democracy in newly created Union Territory of Jammu Kashmir. These moves were followed by detention of hundreds of political leaders including three former chief ministers of the state including one sitting MP, shackling the voice of Jammuites by putting Jammu leaders under house arrest and the subsequent clampdown, communication and internet blockade that disconnected the entire population of the Jammu and Kashmir from each other and from the world outside. Total communication blackout in the region, is the spongy snack served to the people in the year 2019, who feel them to be pushed back to the Stone Age in the much propagated ‘Digital India’. The communication blackout created an information black hole that severely curtailed or suppressed people’s lives.
According to a report available on search engines titled, “Kashmir’s Information Blockade” released on September 4 by the Network of Women in Media, India (NWMI) and the Free Speech Collective (FSC), the continued communication shutdown in Kashmir has resulted in “throttling of independent media”. The report further says that “Our examination revealed a grim and despairing picture of the media in Kashmir, fighting for survival against the most incredible of odds, as it works in the shadow of security forces in one of the most highly militarized zones of the world and a myriad government controls”. Free flow of information has been blocked and journalists continue to face severe restrictions in all processes of news gathering, verification and dissemination, according to the report, leaving behind “a troubled silence that bodes ill for freedom of expression and media freedom.” This also is unhappy anecdote in the year 2019, and people of J&K feel heat of authoritarianism.
On the national scenario, this has been the year when the parliament cleared several important bills. Some most remember able moments of 2019 can be clubbed as: important bills including the one that scrapped Jammu and Kashmir's special status, another law that came into force this year and made headlines is the Citizenship Amendment Act that for the first time makes religion the test of citizenship in India, a historic verdict on the century-old legal dispute over the land in Ayodhya and many more.
Let’s take the time to keep away the snapshots and forget, what the year 2019 has given us and let us go ahead & welcome 2019 that may explore new opportunities and we will get exceptional reward. Wish the year 2020 brings the warmth of love and illuminates our path of life towards a positive direction. |
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