Excelsior Correspondent
JAMMU, Oct 20: After suffering heavy shelling and firing in their village Suchetgarh Kullian in Samba sector, the people of the village were no facing apathy of the administration in the migrant camp at Kali Bari community hall near Samba Railway Station, where they had reached last night.
About 100 migrants including women and children were camping in the community hall while an equal number of people from the village had left for the houses of their relatives. Only few male members of the village were left in the house to feed the cattle.
According to Darshan Singh, Sarpanch of Sadoh Panchayat Halqa in Suchetgarh Kullian, the villagers had been left with no other option but to migrate due to heavy mortar shelling and firing by the Pakistan Rangers on the intervening night of October 18 and 19 in which several houses were damage but luckily all the people survived.
Singh, who arranged breakfast for the people in the absence of any help from civil and police administration of Samba district, said the people were adopting wait and watch policy and they could return to their houses if there was no firing from Pakistan side for next two days.
National Panthers Party MLA from Samba Yashpal Kundal visited the migrants this morning and arranged rice and pulse for them for their dinner. He also inter-acted with the migrants and assured them full support.
However, the migrants strongly regretted apathy of civil administration towards them. Even after Sarpanch Darshan Singh spoke to the authorities in Samba, they deputed a Naib Tehsildar to the spot but he provided no help to the migrants.
“Yesterday, we learnt that the officials of district administration and public official were busy enjoying Kapil Sharma’s comedy at 17 Miles but even today none of them visited us to listen to our problems,’’ said Som Nath, another migrant from village Avtal Katalan of Suchetgarh Kullian.
He warned that the migrants would be forced to take to the streets if the administration didn’t arrange a ‘langar’ for them in the community hall till they returned to their village on restoration of normalcy.
Mango Devi and Kunti Devi, two elderly women of the village, said they had seen mortar shelling for the first time.
“Even during heightened tensions after 2001 Parliament attack, the Rangers used to fire bullets only. This was for the first time that Pakistan has been resorting to heavy mortar shelling,’’ they said recounting horrified night of October 18 and 19 when nearly 20 mortar shells fell in the village.
Bodh Raj, Tirath Ram and Bishan Dass of Suchetgarh Kullian said they were also worried about their crops, which were ready for cutting.
“If the firing didn’t stop, the crops would be destroyed. On the one our houses have suffered damage while on the other, we will lose our crops,’’ they said calling upon the Indian Government to exert pressure on Pakistan to stop firing so that they could return to their houses and cut the crops.
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