by admin | May 25, 2021 | News, Politics
Jammu : Security cover of 18 separatist leaders and 155 Jammu and Kashmir politicians has been withdrawn in the aftermath of the Pulwama attack on February 14 in which over 40 CRPF troopers were killed.
An order issued by the Home Department late on Wednesday said security cover of separatists and some mainstream politicians was also being withdrawn/downgraded apart from those that were initially withdrawn on February 18.
As per the new order, the new list includes names from the National Conference, Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), Bharatiya Janata Party and the Congress.
Some of them are Hurriyat leader Syed Ali Shah Geelani, Jammu Kashmir Liberation Front (JKLF) chief Yasin Malik, former IAS officer Shah Faesal and PDP leader Waheed Para.
“Over 1,000 personal security guards and 100 vehicles provided to the secured persons are being withdrawn,” officials said here.
The security cover of four senior separatist leaders — Mirwaiz Umer Farooq, Shabir Shah, Professor Abdul Gani Bhat and Bilal Lone were already withdrawn on Monday.
The decision to cut down heavily on separatist leaders’ cover was taken in the aftermath of the Pulwama attack when an explosive-packed SUV rammed into a bus of a Central Reserve Police Force convoy on the Jammu-Srinagar highway killing 40 paramilitary troopers on the spot in the worst-ever terror attack in the state since militancy struck there in 1989.
—IANS
by admin | May 25, 2021 | News
Srinagar : Reciprocating the support offered to Kashmiri students and others by Sikhs in Jammu and elsewhere in India after the suicide bombing in Kashmir, Kashmiri Muslims have announced a number of goodwill gestures for the Sikh community in the Kashmir Valley.
“A Sikh brother from Tral owes me Rs 48,000. In view of his weak financial capacity, I have written it off,” said a Kashmiri Muslim on the social media on Thursday.
Free coaching for Sikh students has been announced by a number of coaching centres in the Valley.
Many doctors, especially in south Kashmir’s Anantnag district, have announced free consultation for Sikh patients while some hospitals announced free admission to patients from the community.
Some shopkeepers have announced special discounts for Sikh shoppers. Even vehicle repair workshops at some places said that free service would be provided to Sikh vehicle owners.
“The goodwill announced for the Sikh community is in response to the overwhelming support offered by members of this community to our children studying outside the Valley,” said Nazir Ahmad, a shopkeeper in Srinagar city.
Members of the Sikh community threw open the gates of their religious places in Nanak Nagar locality of Jammu city when Kashmiris felt threatened on February 15 after miscreants torched and damaged many of their vehicles.
“We were told to park our vehicles in the compounds of ‘gurdwaras’ and even in the house compounds of Sikhs in Nanak Nagar area,” said a Muslim who was in Jammu city when authorities had to impose curfew to maintain law and order on February 15.
Reports here said ‘langars’ (free community Kitchens) were set up by the Sikhs in Punjab and some other places for Kashmiri students and other locals doing business outside Jammu and Kashmir.
Media reports said Sikhs also came out in overwhelming support of Kashmiri students studying in Uttarakhand, Haryana, Punjab, Delhi and other states.
—IANS
by admin | May 25, 2021 | Employment, Government Jobs, News, Politics
New Delhi : Union cabinet has given its nod to 10 per cent quota for poor among the general categories in Jammu and Kashmir and also approved the provision for SC/ST reservation in promotion in government jobs in the state.
Minister of State in PMO Jitendra Singh said since Jammu and Kashmir is under the President’s Rule, the Cabinet on Tuesday in its meeting took these decisions.
Talking to reporters here at his official residence, Singh thanked Prime Minister Narendra Modi and said it will help a certain section of society which belongs to lower economic strata and will benefit equally Jammu and Kashmir like other states.
He said the government had introduced the provision of reservation in promotion for Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes.
“That too has been approved for Jammu and Kashmir,” he said.
“It will enable Jammu and Kashmir to be beneficiaries of the same public welfare measures for the benefit of the weaker sections that PM Modi initiated for the rest of the country,” he said.
Hailing the decision Singh said that these decisions show the Prime Minister’s extremely sensitive concern for the state.
“In the last 65 years, no earlier government had ever taken an initiative on these lines and even now these decisions have come forth in the interest of the state because of the Modi Government being at the helm at the Centre,” he said.
The Union Cabinet had in January this year took the decision to provide for 10 per cent quota for people belonging to ‘unreserved categories’, including Christians and Muslims, in jobs and education with an annual income limit of Rs 8 lakh and land-holding ceiling of about five acres, highly-placed sources said.
A Constitution Amendment bill for the purpose was recently passed by the Parliament.
—IANS
by admin | May 25, 2021 | News
Srinagar : Clashes broke out in Anantnag on Wednesday after reports of a Ph.D scholar being killed in a shootout even as the authorities continued to face separatist protests against Sunday’s civilian deaths in Kulgam for the second consecutive day.
Sabzar Sofi, the Ph.D scholar, was killed along with his associate Asif Ahmed in Nowgam earlier in the day.
Skirmishes broke out immediately in the city outskirts as stone pelting youths attacked the security forces forcing schools and colleges to shut down in the Srinagar district.
In New Delhi, Jamia Milia Islamia refuted news reports that Sabzar Sofi had ever registered as a student with the university. It also said that there was no Botany department in the university as was reported by the media.
Clashes also broke out in Sangam area of Anantnag district where Sofi is from. People were outraged at the killing of the militant who was seen preparing for the civil service exams before joining militancy in October 2016.
People in Kulgam town saw heavy deployment of security personnel as the authorities continued restrictions in the Jammu and Kashmir town to prevent separatist-called protest march against seven civilian deaths in an explosion on Sunday.
All roads leading to Kulgam town were sealed. The march was called by the Joint Resistance Leadership on Tuesday in solidarity with the families of the seven killed in an explosion at the gunfight site in Laroo village.
Senior separatist leaders Syed Ali Geelani and Mirwaiz Umer Farooq have been under house arrest since Monday while Yasin Malik was taken into preventive custody.
—IANS
by admin | May 25, 2021 | News
Assistant Professor Muhammad Rafi Bhat
By Sheikh Qayoom,
Srinagar : He had a doctoral degree, a contractual job in the university and a bright future ahead in academics. He was married to a girl barely 20 years of age and was respected as a teacher.
“Soft spoken, humble and always ready to help,” was how he was described by his students in the Department of Sociology who said he never missed a class during his 18-month stint in college.
So how does a man like him go over to the dark side?
That’s the question that sociologists and politicians in Jammu and Kashmir are grappling with.
The death of 33-year-old Assistant Professor Muhammad Rafi Bhat in a gunfight between holed-up militants and security forces in Shopian district on Sunday defies logic.
Kashmir has seen any number of local youth being swayed by the cycle of violence. “But this is the case of a social scientist who is supposed to fully understand the dynamics of the society he lives in,” said a sociologist who did not want to be named. When something like this happens, it points to something seriously wrong with the society that we live in, the sociologist added.
Bhat came from a poor family in north Kashmir’s Chunduna village and going through his studies and getting a doctorate did not come easy to him. He served as a Class IV employee in the state’s Sheep Development Department to collect money for the books and journals he needed to complete his doctoral research.
Some 18 years ago he had made an attempt to join the militants, but was prevented by the secutiry forces from doing so. That must have been when he was a struggling teenager without too much of a direction in life. But what made him re-visit the folly of his younger days?
“A social scientist is the doctor to whom you take students and others to rationalise societal strains so that logical explanations are found to keep society in good health,” says Naeem Akhtar, senior ruling Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) leader and minister. Yet, if such a man chooses to end his life the way Bhat did, “we all need to understand where we are headed”, he added.
Bhat disappeared last Friday and was killed within less than two days of joining the militant ranks.
Just a few days before going over he had sold his car.
In his last phone call to his mother on Friday afternoon, he told her he would be home and also asked her if she needed anything from the city. He also told her not to worry if he reached home late.
The last call he made was to his father when the gunfight was raging in the Badigam village of Shopian district where he was trapped inside with Hizbul commander Sadam Paddar and three other militants.
“Forgive me if I have hurt you. I am going to meet Allah,” he said and the conversation between Bhat and his father ended.
His death has brought Kashmir face to face with a reality which is both intriguing and worrying. No easy answers seem to be coming forth.
(Sheikh Qayoom can be contacted at sheikh.abdul@ians.in)
—IANS
