Developmental projects, besides entailing lot of resources to be roped in, include dislocation of inhabitants who need to be properly settled and rehabilitated. The fallout of various decisions taken by the Government from time to time, often leads to involuntary displacement of people depriving them of their land, livelihood and shelter besides uprooting them from their socio- cultural environment. To address this important issue, patch work and ad-hoc measures cannot be justified to be resorted to and therefore, needs to be addressed under a well devised State policy.
It is heartening to note that for the first time, Jammu and Kashmir was going to have an all- inclusive Rehabilitation and Resettlement (R&R) policy for the people affected due to various developmental projects. We have reliably learnt that the final draft has already been prepared and was going to be placed before the State Administrative Council (SAC) headed by the Governor, shortly for approval. It has been felt that broader concerted efforts were required to be taken well before or at the time of planning developmental projects so as to include in the displacement, rehabilitation and resettlement process framework not only those who directly lose land and other assets but also those who are affected by acquisition of assets.
Governor’s administration has taken a commendable step towards rehabilitation and resettlement of the affected people due to various developmental works needing acquisitioning of private land and one can only wonder that successive State Governments had no time to address this issue under a well devised and set policy.
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