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| 2020 proved to be most significant year for WPRs | | |
Early Times Report
jammu, Jan 1: The outbreak of COVID-19 led to many people terming the year 2020 as gruesome and deadly but it had a silver lining also, the West Pakistani Refugees for the first time in the past 70-years got a chance to exercise their franchise in Jammu and Kashmir.
WPRs for the first time cast their votes in the maiden District Development Council elections that were held in Jammu and Kashmir after the abrogation of Article 370.
The voting rights that were denied to WPRs since 1947 were given to them in 2020 empowering them to choose their own representative.
These PoK based refugees were displaced from their houses and forced to take shelter in Jammu 70 years ago. And what was more unfortunate and worrisome was that their plight failed to move the international organisations, the Central and State governments.
The three generations of displaced people from PoK faced poverty, discrimination and apathy and they were forced to live in 39 filthy camps.
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 due to them being treated as second class citizens.
Erstwhile political regimes in Jammu and Kashmir government didn't bother to address the issues and hardships faced by more than 36000 families who had taken shelter in Jammu after facing prosecution in PoK.
Under the Prime Minister's Special Package, Rs 2000 crore were sanctioned by the Government of India for 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 erstwhile state regime for the welfare of WPRs.
The year 2020 has brought these unfortunate people at par with the other J&K residents. |
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