Srinagar: Senior Congress leader Rajni Patil on Tuesday said the people of Jammu and Kashmir were angry about it being made a union territory and demanded restoration of its statehood as well as adequate constitutional safeguards for the protection of jobs and land rights.
“It is for the first time that a state has been downgraded to a UT and then bifurcated. The people here are angry, they are worried about their jobs and their land. They say if the people from outside get the jobs here, what will they do. They say they had rights over their jobs and land, but have been deprived of that now,” Patil told reporters here.
She sought immediate restoration of Jammu and Kashmir’s statehood and adequate constitutional safeguards for the protection of jobs and land rights of the people of Jammu, Kashmir and Ladakh.
Patil, who is in charge of party affairs in Jammu and Kashmir, also demanded immediate release of all political prisoners, including PDP chief and former chief minister Mehbooba Mufti, who was released hours later on Tuesday.
Criticising the BJP government at the Centre over three recent farm sector legislations, Patil said that in 2014 the Narendra Modi government made huge promises of doubling the income of farmers and providing them much relief, but it seems all the promises have fallen flat on the ground.
“Such black laws should be rolled back. Otherwise, the farmers will face huge losses, she said.
Talking about the alleged gang-rape and death of a young woman in Hathras in Uttar Pradesh, the Congress leader said the woman was cremated in the dead of the night.
“The Modi government says ‘Beti Bachao, Beti Padhao’, but we want to ask this government if daughters are not saved, how will they be educated, she said.
Patil said the Congress would fight the attempts being made to create polarisation in the country.
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