KL NEWS NETWORK
SRINAGAR
Kashmir Centre for Social and Development Studies (KCDS) Wednesday expressed anguish over the “creation of an atmosphere of fear and insecurity for Jammu Muslims” by the present coalition government.
“On the feedback received from various civil society groups and individuals,” a KCSDS statement said Wednesday, “a meeting chaired by Prof Hameedah Nayeem was convened in Srinagar in which KCSDS members observed with deep concern that during past 100 days; the coalition government has dislodged Muslim officers from their postings in the district administration under a sinister design of disempowering the entire Muslim population of the region and establish Dogra hegemony in these areas.”
The members further observed that eviction of Muslims from deemed forest land is part of the same “sinister design of the communal forces within the government”.
“Otherwise, it is a known fact that the tribal Muslims have been permitted to settle in these areas since 1931 by the then Maharaja. It is also a fact that the posh colonies of Jammu including Gandhi Nagar and Trikuta Nagar also belong to the same category of land. This shows that the communal forces are hell-bent on repeating 1947 when under a deliberate communal plan; Muslims were wiped out of Jammu district through a genocidal operation,” the statement maintained.
The members observed with deep concern that over past several decades the share of developmental funds due to Chenab and Pirpanjal Valleys has been eaten up “arbitrarily by the dominant few districts of Jammu region which has resulted in gross under development and backwardness of these Valleys”.
“This fact is borne out by governments’ own economic survey report which puts Jammu district on the top in the developmental index and Poonch at its tail end.”
The civil society demands that there should be mixed postings of all communities in all the areas of the state to maintain checks and balances on the “hegemonic approach of one community in this highly polarized atmosphere”.
“The civil society also warns of dire consequences if the selected evictions of Muslims are not stopped forthwith as it is highly discriminatory, arbitrary and unjust move to compel a particular community to leave the Jammu district and facilitate one community’s supremacy in all matters,” the statement said.
KCSDS reiterates its demand for the preparation of a white paper by the government on all developmental allocations and projects’ implementation in the entire state in order to make necessary amends for its failure to develop Pirpanjal and Chenab Valleys in concord with other districts of Jammu besides Kashmir Valley that has been grossly discriminated against in all matters, the statement concluded.
