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| What will Govt do to unspent grants sanctioned for west Pak refugees? | | Amid citizenship promises, questions about utilised money dominate scenes | | Early Times Report
Jammu, Mar 18: At a time when the central government is asserting that with the rollback of Article 370 and the re-organisation of erstwhile J&K State into Union Territory, the Pakistan occupied Kashmir (PoK) and West Pakistan Refugees have qualified for citizenship rights, there are questions being raised about whether the funds sanctioned for their upliftment will be utilised to the fullest.
In her Budget speech in Lok Sabha on March 17, the Union Finance Minister said that with the abrogation of Article 370 and Re-organisation of State into Union Territory, the PaK and West Pakistan Refugees have qualified for citizenship rights which were denied to them since 1947. “They will now get all the rights due to every citizen of this country. The Government shall take care of their rehabilitation needs,” she said.
Meanwhile, there are concerns about the central grants meant for the betterment of these refugees that have been kept in limbo for no reason by the past regimes. Will those central grants be allowed to get lapse or the process for their utilisation is expedited.
The documents reveal that under the Prime Minister’s Special Package, Rs 2000 crore were sanctioned by the Government of India for the rehabilitation and one time settlement of 36384 families from PoK.
As per the documents, out of these sanctioned Rs 2000 crores, not even a single rupee was spent by the state regime- putting a lid over the murky system in vogue and step- motherly treatment being given to the already ill-fated people.
These PoK based refugees were displaced from their houses and forced to take shelter in Jammu 70 years ago. And what is more unfortunate and worrisome is that their plight failed has so far failed out rightly to move the world organisations, the Centre and state governments.
There have been already reports about how the three generations of people displaced from PoK were faced with poverty, discrimination and apathy and forced to live in 39 filthy camps.
Patiently, the Government of India appointed an Interlocutor (Dineshwar Sharma) to get the views of various sections of the society in November last year. he has been visiting Kashmir Valley and listening to the people and their woes. What has raised eye brows is that Sharma has he not visited for a single time the people displaced from PoK yet.
Thousands of refugees, who were forced to leave the areas of Kashmir occupied by Pakistan in 1947, were provided land in different parts of the Jammu region in 1960s but they did not get benefits of different government housing schemes or access to bank loans.
This is considered by many a gruesome act that when refugee rights are being raised every where, the Jammu and Kashmir government didn’t bother to address the issues and hardships being faced by more than thirty six thousand families who took shelter in Jammu after facing prosecution in PoK. These ill- fated people left everything behind and took shelter in the state with the hope that they and their children would find a better life. |
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