New Delhi: A serious miscarriage of history has been undone after 70 years with the notification of the new domicile rules by the Jammu and Kashmir administration, Union Minister Jitendra Singh said on Tuesday.
Terming the new rules as dawn of a new era for the Union Territory, he said “history will vindicate us” and prove that this course correction was in keeping with the principle of equality and the norms of a healthy democracy.
“A serious miscarriage of history has been undone after 70 years by the Jammu & Kashmir domicile rules notification,” said Singh, the Minister of State for the Personnel Ministry.
People belonging to West Pakistan, Valmikis, women marrying outside communities, non-registered Kashmiri migrants, displaced people will soon get domicile under a new set of rules issued by the Jammu and Kashmir administration on Monday.
Singh noted that three generations of people of Jammu and Kashmir had been denied their right to live with justice and dignity, and it was heartening to see this redemption happening in this lifetime. This – notification of new rules — will prove to be a blessing for future generations, he said.
The minister also expressed satisfaction that he and some of his contemporaries got an opportunity to be a part of this exercise, if not wholly, at least in a very small measure.
While West Pakistan refugees and displaced persons from Pakistan occupied Jammu and Kashmir (PoJK) have been restored their legitimate rights, Singh said discrimination of several decades has been undone and those who are opposing this move are only exposing themselves to the accusation that for the last 70 years they had been thriving on politics of discrimination.
“It is an irony that all India service officers, including IAS and IPS, who devoted 30 to 35 years of their life to serve in Jammu & Kashmir were, at the end of the day, after superannuation, asked to pack up, leave and look for a place elsewhere to settle,” he said.
This was quite in contrast to the arrangement in several states and UTs where the all India service officers of state cadre are not only allowed to settle but are also provided plots of land for the same, said Singh, who represents Jammu and Kashmir’s Udhampur in Lok Sabha.
Similarly, a gross injustice was being done to the children of these officials who did their entire schooling in Jammu and Kashmir but were debarred from applying for admission to higher education institutions there, the minister said.
Singh said, this should be seen as an opportunity for wider exposure and capacity building for children, so that they can prepare themselves to flourish in global India.
