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| Despite facing extinction Pandits continue to be wooed by politicians | | | Early Times Report
Jammu, May 5: As if they were rare species the mainstream political parties besides even a section among the separatists have started wooing Kashmiri Pandits, who since 1990 are a displaced community.
Earlier several Kashmiri separatists, including Molvi Umar Farooq, Prof. Abdul Gani Bhat, Mohd. Yasin Mailk and to some extent, Syed Ali Shah Geelani, have favoured return of Kashmiri Pandits to the Valley, which they had left following the rise of Pakistan sponsored insurgency. The latest to join the chorus is Shabir Ahmed Shah who has stated that Kashmir was incomplete without Pandits.
Right from mid-90's Shah has been the lone separatist leader who had series of interaction with a cross section of displaced people in Jammu and Delhi. He had invited prominent Pandits to several conferences he had organised in Jammu till a decade ago.
However, his urge to promote contact between the Pandits and people in the Valley and his desire to widen the base of his interaction with the displaced people in Jammu received a setback during the last three years after the National Conference led Government instructed the police to impose heavy restrictions on Shah's movement by either placing him under house arrest or by keeping him in jail.
Indications are that the PDP leadership has picked up the thread where Shah had left in a bid to widen its base within the community and in order to infuse confidence among the displaced people which was needed for their return to Kashmir.
After the migration of the Pandits, Congress and the BJP had established a minority wing essentially for allowing the community people a chance to find representation. It was followed later by the National Conference which received help from Vijay Bakaya, MLC and a former Chief Secretary.
Similarly the BJP has appointed Ashok Kaul as the secretary of the party and has established political links with All India Kashmiri Samaj through its President, Moti Kaul. This is part of the move to woo Pandits.
Though the PDP leadership started making belated inroads in the displaced circles it has succeeded in enlisting bigger support from the community than the National Conference and the Congress have registered. This success was the result of a personal bond built by Mufti Mohd. Sayeed, Mohd. Dilawar Mir, Mehbooba Mufti, Molvi Iftikhar Hussain Ansari, Muzaffar Hussain Beig and other leaders during the last three months.
The PDP leadership has made a commitment on creating atmosphere that was conducive for the return of Pandits to the Valley what seems to confuse and worry mainstream political leaders is growing factional feuds among the displaced people.
Number of leaders belonging to the PDP, Congress, BJP and the NC do confess that groupism in the displaced community has not allowed the Pandits to throw up a leader or a leadership that can claim to represent the entire community. During the last 22 years the level of dissensions and groupism has gone so high that several community leaders are seen indulging in leg pulling.
One hears babble of voices not only from the community leaders in Jammu, New Delhi, Bangalore, Mumbai, Kolkata and in some towns in Punjab, Haryana, UP, Himachal and Gujarat but also from the camps in Muthi, Mishriwalla, Purkhoo and Jagati. What they want is lost in the din of the babble?
The growing dissensions and diversity, instead of unity, among the community have encouraged the State and the Central Governments to take a nonserious view of the plight and problems of the displaced people. The separatists take them lightly while the mainstream political leaders opt for a lip service so that they could seek help from the displaced people during the Assembly and the Lok Sabha elections.
The Pandits have demonstrated their relevance in the poll process during the time voters in Kashmir responded to the election boycott call given by the separatists. Despite the fact that Pandits do not constitute any major vote bank they have shaped the destiny of some candidates when a number of Assembly constituencies witnessed 10 to 20 per cent polling. |
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