ABOUT 17 Kashmiri Pandit families have left the Valley since May this year after the targeted killings of the members of the community, according to the Kashmiri Pandit Sangharsh Samiti (KPSS), an organization of the Pandits’ who hadn’t fled Kashmir in the early nineties. The District Administration Shopian has, however, rebutted the KPSS claim saying the families have left to spend summer in the warm Jammu following the end of the harvest season. And this appears to be true also. A large number of Kashmiris migrate to Jammu, Delhi and other parts of the country to escape the harsh winter.
However, the KPSS has stuck to its guns saying several Pandit families have quietly shifted to Jammu in the wake of the recent targeted attacks on the community. In a tweet on Monday, the KPSS said that nine more families of resident Kashmiri Pandits had left South Kashmir bringing the total to 17 families so far this year. If true, these are the Pandits who had not left Kashmir in the early nineties but now are doing so. These families from Shopian district’s Chaudharygund and Chotigam villages had stayed put even when the militancy was at its peak in the 1990s According to reports quoting locals, only one Pandit woman is left of the eight families in Chaudharygund and she too is moving out. The villages witnessed the killings of two Pandits in the last two months. In this village, a Pandit named Puran Krishan Bhat was killed by militants outside his ancestral house on October 15. Two migrant labourers were also killed soon after.
This is a distressing situation. At least 17 people have been killed in targeted attacks on civilians, minorities and migrants across Kashmir this year. Of these, three were Kashmiri Pandits. The civilian killings in Kashmir have become a big issue in the Valley and across the country. In the Valley, the killings have become a deep source of worry for the security forces who are already stretched. According to an estimate, there are around 8000 minority employees including Kashmiri Pandits who are posted in Kashmir, and it would be a security nightmare to protect all of them. Hence the serious concern expressed by the various political parties across the country is understandable.
The concern has further been aggravated by the media reports of the exodus of Pandit families from various parts of the Valley, which, however, have been denied by the government. Pandits are demanding that the government waive off the bond requiring them to remain permanently posted in Kashmir. And if the government gave in to their demand, it would defeat the very purpose of the Pandits’ employment in Kashmir: the purpose behind this was to somehow incentivize the return of Pandits to their homeland. This is, thus, a very tricky situation and the government needs to do a tightrope walk to ensure both of its ends are served: killings stop altogether and Pandits also don’t leave. So, the administration needs to do more to provide a sense of security to the community and take firm steps to stop the killings. Here is also hoping that Pandit families who are claimed to have left the Valley return to the Valley in early spring next year.
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