Ashok Bhan, the chairman of the Kashmir Policy and Strategy Group (KPSG ), has put forward four points for the Central government to act on with regard to Jammu and Kashmir.
With the anniversary of the displacement of Kashmiri Pandits from the Kashmir Valley falling on Friday, the Senior Advocate said the government should constitute a truth and reconciliation commission as put forth by the Supreme Court in its Article 370 verdict.
Bhan said the government should engage with stakeholders and, particularly, exiled Kashmiri Pandits and create a time-bound plan for their safe, dignified and politically empowered return to the Valley.
He said the government should revive the identity and existence of the people of Jammu and Kashmir hurt by the bifurcation of the state by restoring statehood to the now Union Territory.
The restoration of statehood should be followed with elections to revive institutional democracy under which an election is the rule and Governor’s rule is temporary and an exception.
The KPSG chairman said his group has been continuously holding a series of dialogues via intra-civil society webinars, meetings and interactions through social media platforms, for giving closure to the societal devastation, death and destruction that has engulfed the larger South Asian region in general and Jammu and Kashmir, in particular.
The Kashmir Valley carries a historical burden in a social context. The people are carrying the burden as victims of conflict from 1947 and continuing consequences of armed insurgency resulting in exile of the religious minority and killings of innocent civilians and state actors in the violence perpetrated by non-state actors.
On the eve of January 19, which the Kashmiri Pandits observe as Holocaust Day, a black day in Kashmir’s history, Bhan said the Kashmiri Pandit community was exiled on this day by gun-toting terrorists and have been living since then as refugees in their own country.
He said the KPSG has always urged the Union Government to engage with KPs and plan their safe and dignified return back home. The 34 years of exile is brutal, long and traumatic, and are native Kashmiris, the prime stakeholders in Kashmir’s affairs. Without KPs, Kashmiri civilisational ethos is incomplete in these modern times.
Bhan recalled the importance accorded to Kashmiri Pandits by the NHRC, Prime Minister Narendra Modi, and the Supreme Court in their utterances.