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| Early morning tale of a city under siege | | | Munish Gupta
Jammu | Aug 6
At 5’ O Clock it is usually too early for Jammu to wake up and rush to markets. Therefore, till few days back when most of the town preferred to sleep only morning walkers would be seen at the break of dawn.
However, this morning a tour across the city presented a different picture of Jammu. The dawn is yet to break and the air is wet and windy yet the bazaars are bustling with customers. Long queues can be witnessed in front of general stores, medical shops, as well as liquor shops alike. People come out of lanes, make enquiries, buy essential
commodities, and then again vanish away quickly.
There is relaxation in curfew for a few hours and people want to make most of this time period before their freedom is curbed and restriction re-imposed. Inside mohallas of old city, people are in groups glued to radios, television sets and newspapers. Apprehensions and rumours are on rife as they believe that dearth of essential commodities would intensify in the days to come and administration would take more rigorous steps to "teach them a lesson."
Some pledge not to give in before the administration and exhort others to muster courage to 'fight against injustice and discrimination'. Apart from children, the emergent situation is a unique experience for all other people who did not witness such a 'mass revolt against
Kashmir based secessionist and separatist politics' as the one was seen in 1953 which was spearheaded by Prem Nath Dogra against Sheikh Abdullah's anti India stance.
Public in general further alleges that they are not getting national dailies for the past couple of days while vendors have been denied by the security forces to deliver papers" they said. Similarly, daily wagers and labourers rued, "Though several social rganization have arranged free of cost food and others have been distributing ration at different places but the security forces are not allowing them to frequent from one place to another."
As Life in Jammu has come to a standstill. The shutdown in the city due to the protest against the cancellation of land transfer to Amarnath Shrine Board is costing a lot to the citizens.
The roads are deserted. Shops, hotels, restaurants and even ATMs greet people with an unwelcome sign. The shutdown in Jammu has affected the economy of the city to a great extent.
With the impasse over the land of Shri Amarnath Ji Shrine Board (SASB) refuses to die down and curfew still in place, the festival of brothers and sisters-Rakshabandan besides Independence Day has came under a big question mark.
Meanwhile as shops have been closed for the past over one month besides currier and post office services are also non-operational, sisters, especially those having their brothers outside the state, are a worried lot as they don't know how to send 'Rakhi.'
Apart from it, business related to the festival like that of sweets and kites have also suffered a setback. Most of the sweets men and kitemakers start preparing their products a month ahead of the festival but this year the current turmoil is proving a hindrance to them also.
According to a school teacher, "Generally, we used to prepare students for Independence Day celebrations a month ahead of the August 15 this year schools have been closed for quite some time so there are no preparations for cultural and patriotic programs."
The festival of Rakhi is scheduled on August 16 but the post offices are closed and even shops selling kites and tricolours are shut. "With the authorities having eyes wide shut towards the people of Jammu and their demands, life has really turned into hell. We are suffering worst kind of human rights violations and I ask Government of India to wake up to the issue well before Independence day and Rakshabandan," said Nisha Gupta, a University student.
She said that unlike every year Rakhis are not available at Gummat, Raghunath Bazar, Parade and other places and she wont be able to send Rakhi to his brother who works with an MNC in Mumbai.
"In case things don't change we will have to resort to e-mail that seems to be only alternative," she said.
However some shopkeepers maintained that there is negligible manufacturing of rakhi within the state and the same is imported from outside the state but with vehicular movement off the road supply of rakhi is being affected.
However sweet makers rued that they have been faced with scarcity of raw material while the kitemakers, mostly from adjoining state Punjab who come to the city every year, have abundant material yet they don’t have takers.
"People over here are busy with the ongoing agitation and no one seems to celebrate festivals and if Government fails to solve the issue in time, we are likely to suffer heavy loses this year" said a kite maker. "It's a question of Hindu Asmita. We are united in the protest till the land is given back to the Shrine board," says Shyam.
The scene at Swarn Cinema in the upmarket Gandhi Nagar area isn't any different. (GFX 2 IN) This 45-year-old, 1,000 seater, cinema is incurring losses close to a lakh on a daily basis.
The security guard, Dhani Ram, says he has never seen anything like this. He is now worried about his salary.
"If the cinema doesn't make profits, how will it pay our salaries," he says. The shutdown has taken a toll on the common man. In spite of the rains, scores of people came out when curfew was relaxed on Tuesday morning to buy essential commodities.
"We are suffering a lot because of the curfew, there's no fuel nothing," says a Jammu citizen.
It has been 35 days since the protest is on in Jammu. The agitation has cost close to 35,000 establishments of this region a whopping of Rs 4,200 crore which means the city is suffering a loss of Rs120 crore daily. The supply of the essential commodities is also on a decline making life more difficult for the common man. |
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