The issue of return and restitution of Pandit IDPs is again raked up by the separatists in their utmost viciousness. Pakistani Foreign Ministry has openly endorsed the policy of Kashmir separatists and pontificated that restitution of the minority in what it has called “ghettos” will be against UN Charter. This is blatant interference in the internal affairs of our country and we outright reject it. Pakistan has no locus standi in this issue. As regards invoking of UN Charter, Pakistan has to tell the world community whether settling Baluch, Punjabis, Chitralis and Swatis in Gilgit Baltistan and changing demographic complexion of Gilgit conforms to the UN Character? How will Pakistan account for banishment of PoK nationalist leadership from the country? How will Pakistan account for carpet bombardment of defying population of Waziristan and Baluchistan?
As far as Kashmiri Pandits are concerned, they are the IDPs under UN Charter, hounded out by Pakistani terrorists and their local accomplices, and as such, they have the right to demand a homeland, a separate enclave, a union administered territory or any other form of rehabilitation that suits them. If the Muslims of undivided India had the right to demand and make a separate state to which Kashmir separatists aspire for accession, the Pandits cannot be denied that choice, and no power on earth can stop them from getting what is their right. Kashmir does not belong only to the people whom Pakistan pampers and provokes to rise in revolt. It belongs to millions of people who are the original citizens of the State and who want to live a life of their own. Nobody can dictate terms to them.
Dr. Jatindra Singh, the MOS in PMO has very rightly said that the story of sacrifices made by the Pandits begins with the martyrdom of Pandit Premi. The community will not forget those precious sacrifices in which hundreds of Pandits became the target of the bullets of Pakistan sponsored terrorists. Pandit IDPs should intensify their struggle for homeland and carry the message all over the country to garner support of vast Indian civil society. They have already made their case before the world community and proved to it that what is going on in Kashmir is a religion based separatist-terrorist upsurge and not a nationalist uprising by any stretch of imagination.
Follow our WhatsApp channel