Kashmir Pandits Expose Human Rights Group

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Pandits to NHRC: Why no Best Bakery-type action in our case

Kashmir Pandits Expose Human Rights Group's Bias

PTI

 

NEW DELHI: Even as diverse reactions over the NHRC move on Best

Bakery case continue to pour in, Kashmiri pandits, subjected to "many

carnages" over last 14 years in the valley, are asking why the rights

body remained a "mute spectator" on their plight and did not take any

such initiative in their case.

 

The miniscule minority community, which was forced out of Kashmir to

be scattered all over the country as "refugees", note that "each

selective killing of pandits by the Islamic militants intending to

cleanse the valley of Hindus was akin to the Best Bakery case."

 

"There are numerous cases where pandits were brutally killed and

their bodies mutilated. Why didn't the NHRC or any such body take

cognisance of these," asks Rajinder Kaul Premi, whose famous poet-

author father Sarwanand Kaul Premi and brother Virender Kaul Premi

were brutally murdered in April 1990.

 

The 64-year-old Premi and his 27-year-old son were dragged out of

their home in Anantnag district on April 29, 1990 and abducted. Their

mutilated bodies were found two days later.

 

"Over these years, we have been repeatedly pleading with NHRC to

intervene so that the culprits could be punished... But there has

been no action," he told PTI.

 

According to government statistics, 454 pandits have been killed and

around 25,000 of their houses burnt down but not a single case has

been tried. While differing on the figures, Kashmiri Samiti president

Sunil Shakdher said, "Each killing tells a nerve-wrecking tale still

the country was unmoved".

 

To cite a few cases of brutal murders, two armed persons barged into

the house of telecom engineer B K Ganju in Kanyakadal area of

Srinagar on an early morning of March 1990. Apprehending trouble,

Ganju hide himself in a drum putting gunny bags over himself.

 

However, the assailants managed to locate him and pumped bullets into

the drum. His wife pleaded with them to kill her and their three-year-

old daughter also but the assailants retorted, "There should be

somebody to mourn his death".

 

"Hundreds of such type of killing of innocent pandits have been

witnessed but the NHRC has remained a mute spectator," he alleged,

pointing out to selective murders and massacres.

 

"What to talk about killings, the NHRC has not cared even as the

entire community of pandits was evicted from the valley," said all

India Kashmiri Pandit Conference (AIKPC) president H N Jattu.

 

Alleging that NHRC was behaving in a "partisan manner", he

asked, "What action has it taken in case of the sufferings of the

pandits."

 

Significantly, deputy Prime Minister L K Advani also recently

regretted that the nation had been "indifferent" to the plight

of "uprooted" Kashmiri pandits and said everyone, including himself,

had to take the blame for it.

 

"The tragedy is that the whole country is indifferent to the plight

of the pandits, who have suffered more violence than any others,"

Advani said.