Srinagar: Peoples Conference president Sajad Gani Lone on Sunday questioned the “silence” of Lok Sabha LoP Rahul Gandhi over the pellet gun victims of Kashmir while expressing concern about the victims in Delhi.
Lone asked why Gandhi’s much-publicised concern over pellet gun injuries in Delhi was “nowhere to be found during years of mass blindings and gruesome pellet violence in Kashmir that left thousands permanently disabled and hundreds robbed of their eyesight forever”.
Lone, while acknowledging Gandhi’s recent move to press for an FIR over a pellet injury sustained in Delhi, demanded to know why the same moral urgency had “never” been extended to the Valley.
“May I, with all the humility at my command, beg to ask why the same effort was not used when pellets were fired in Kashmir on many occasions,” the Handwara MLA said in a statement.
He said the scale of that suffering in Kashmir is staggering and documented.
Between 2016 and 2017, the Jammu and Kashmir government’s own records reported 6,221 people injured by pellet firing, including 782 with eye injuries, Lone said.
“Hundreds lost their eyesight and were blinded for life, with permanent visual impairment. Thousands were disabled permanently because of gruesome injuries,” Lone, who was a minister in the PDP-BJP government from 2015 to 2018, said.
The Peoples Conference president said that when pellets were first “unleashed” on the Valley in 2010, dozens were blinded and hundreds injured, leaving behind what he described as severe and permanent disability that the country has “chosen to forget”.
“Why was the same concern not shown for those Kashmiris who were blinded or grievously injured? Are Kashmiris less human than others in this country?” he asked.
Lone said Gandhi should come to Kashmir and try to get an FIR registered for the pellet victims here too.
“It is still not too late. You can come here and talk about it and even try to register an FIR. This would at least put focus on those forgotten pellet victims,” he said.
