Kashmiri Pandits' organization Panun Kashmir took serious concern on the introduction of the Permanent Resident (Disqualification) Bill by a PDP member in J&K Lagislative Council. The Bill seeks to disqualify the permanent residence status of a state subject female of Jammu and Kashmir in the event of her marriage to a non-resident.
Addressing a Press Confrence in Jammu , Ashwani Kumar Chrungoo, President, Panun Kashmir said that the Bill is highly dangerous in the sense that it eventually would lead to a demographic shift in the population of Jammu province. At a time when the women of the nation are being empowered with 33 percent reservation in the polity of India , the draconian Permanent Resident (Disqualification) bill seeks to take away the hereditary rights of the women of Jammu and Kashmir State .
Ashwani Chrungoo said, Kashmiri Pandit community had already opposed vehemently this Bill when it was introduced earlier in another form by the then government of the State. The people of this state have been witnessing a barrage of such anti-national and anti-people measures being taken by the ruling clique over the last one year. Despite strong opposition by the nationalist forces of the state, the ruling class seems to be determined to disturb the political atmosphere of the state.
He said instead of addressing the issues of displacement and measures to provide succor to the terrorism effected people of the state, the government is making efforts to disfranchise the womenfolk of the state by bringing draconian Bills in the Assembly.
He told reporters that Panun Kashmir will resist all such medieval measures that tend to discriminate between peoples on the basis of gender and divest people of their rightful claim on the territory of Jammu and Kashmir.He also expresses serious concern over the reported parleys being held by ‘some foreign diplomats’ with the secessionist leaders in the Kashmir valley.
Convener Panun Kashmir Dr. Agnishekhar also took serious note of the legislative and non legislative measures under process of the coalition government , brazenly aimed against the Kashmiri Pandits and against the Jammu region.
He termed the bill as brazenly discriminatory against the women - particularly belonging to the Kashmiri Pandit community and the Jammu province.Panun Kashmir would fight the move tooth and nail and expressed full solidarity with the people of Jammu Province to launch a joint effective struggle against the move of the government,said Agnisheker.
Panun Kashmir castigates the State and the Central Governments for maintaining a phenomenally criminal silence over the killing of more than 1200 Kashmiri Pandits , for not taking any action against the perpetrators of planned massacres of Kashmiri Pandits in the wake of out breaking of armed Islamic terrorism and fundamentalism since 1989-90 in Kashmir . Instead, murderers like Yaseen Malik, Bita Karatey and other terrorists turned separatist leaders , are eulogized and accorded VVIP treatment while Narindra Modi , the Gujarat Chief Minister can be summoned by special investigation team (SIT) for "questioning" in post Godhra riots (not Godhra ) in the state in 2002.
Meanwhile opposition parties in Lagislative assembly today including Bharaitya Janata Party (BJP), Jammu and Kashmir National Panthers Party (JKNPP) and Jammu State Morcha (JSM) staged a walk out. The members of these parites indulged in Slogan shouting and protests for 20 minutes before staging a walk out. BJP's Chaman Lal Gupta said that the bill discriminated against women.
JKNPP leader Harshdev Singh said,"A bill which is aimed at amending the Constitution of Jammu and Kashmir cannot be introduced in the Upper House. Every bill has to go through assembly for its passage."
It may be mentioned here that J&K Permanent Residents (Disqualification) Bill 2010 was moved by the opposition People’s Democratic Party’s (PDP) Murtaza Ahmad Khan in the Upper House in Jammu on Monday which was admitted by State legislative council. The controversial bill which seeks to strip women of permanent residentship if they marry a man from outside the state.will come up for discussion and vote in the next session in Srinagar . The bill seeks to provide that a female permanent resident after her marriage or a non-permanent resident female on termination of her marriage shall lose the status of a permanent resident..
At present women of Jammu and Kashmir who marry a non-resident are allowed to inherit property, apply for jobs and contest elections. If the legislation is passed, they will lose most of the privileges.
A similar legislation had sailed through in the legislative assembly, but failed in the Upper House in 2004,
Several activists of JK National Panthers Party demonstrated in Jammu against the introduction of an anti-women bill in the Legislative Council of J&K seeking Disqualification of girls marrying outside the state as a permanent resident.
Statement said that the Congress ministers welcomed the bill moved by PDP which proves that Congress has connived against women. Earlier in 2003, such a bill was defeated in the Legislative Council by forceful opposition by Prof. Bhim Singh, Chairman, National Panthers Party who was Member of Legislative Council at that time.
The activists of Panthers burnt the effigy of the bill and warned of dangerous consequences that J&K government shall be responsible.
