News from Kashmiri Pandits

Sudha Rajput
June 12, 2013, 7:07 pm

Extracted from the story in Kashmir Times
By P.N. Sus
June 2013
The willingness shown for their [KP families] return and rehabilitation under the PMs package is more a mirage than a reality. These are the only occasions where we see such expression to show its existence. It is a skillful trend observed when the elections are drawing near and the power icons start campaigning by spewing sugar coated pills to draw political mileage. In the last two decades there has not been a whisper of word about their package of return.
More than two decades have passed and we are away from our homes. We have houses but not homes. What has been the contribution of the government for KPs rehabilitation can be seen from how they were thrown listlessly on cross roads, picked up from dust and pushed in one room tenements worse than the ghettos of Nazi Germany in Hitler’s time. Next step taken by the government is rehabilitating them at Jagti. Are we to understand that we.. have no right to live like other citizens with dignity, rights and privileges. The half hearted efforts of the centre and state government for our rehabilitation is despicable… The greatest challenge before the community is that we are marching towards fatal end of extinction. We know that there are hearts who bleed for us. But there are agencies who stand as blocks in our return.
Talks, dialogue inside the state and outside with neighbors have been more a show than indication of seriousness to resolve the issue.
—P.N. Sus,
129 Surya Vihar, Bhori, Jammu.
http://www.kashmirtimes.com/newsdet.aspx?q=15439

Sudha Rajput
June 12, 2013, 6:51 pm
A look at the historic and ancient temples that the KP families left behind in the Valley, at the time of their eviction in 1989.

The latest reports note that many historic and ancient temples that the Kashmiri Pandit families revered, back in the Valley, have now been neglected, torched, purposely destroyed and are in ruins. Unfortunately when they are torched nothing is done about it, making them the “worst victims of the genocide and exile of the Hindu community” (niticentral.com). With the forceful eviction of the Hindu families, naturally the Valley has lost its caretakers and the trustees of such icons. Even State authorities admit and are aware of the fact that as many as 200 temples have been damaged over “two decades of militancy in the Valley” (ibid).
The dilemma is in the absence of the Hindu devotees, who should care for these temples, the Kashmiri Muslims?
http://www.niticentral.com/2013/04/20/hindu-shrines-under-threat-in-jk-68599.html

Internal Displacement of Kashmiri Pandits:

Based on the premise that 250,000 people were displaced from the Kashmir Valley, beginning in 1989, my doctoral research led me to investigate the reasons why, even after 22 yrs of their displacement, people had not been able to return to their homes, and that more people had fled since that time.  This is given the fact that there are ‘return policies’ in place. I was looking for clues, which seemed to be embedded in the positions and perspectives of different actors of this displacement.  To get to the bottom of the matter, I thought it important to investigate the worldviews of all key actors of this displacement, namely the policymakers, policy implementers, the relevant NGOs, members of the host communities and the displaced themselves.