From Our
Correspondent
MIRPUR (AJK): Azad Jammu Kashmir President Sardar Masood Khan said on Saturday that after the revocation of Articles 35-A and 370 on August 5, 2019, any semblance of autonomy enjoyed by the people of Indian Occupied Jammu and Kashmir (IoJK) has been done away.
Furthermore, he said that Indian government’s proposed amendment to the Jammu and Kashmir Development Act would give the occupation forces full authority to declare any part of IOJK as a “strategic area”, allowing them to “legitimise” land grab within the disputed territory. The president made these comments while addressing a seminar on Kashmir organised by the Ministry of Information and Broadcasting in the federal capital, the AJK Presidential secretariat later told media here.
Masood Khan said that almost a year had elapsed since the occupational lockdown had been imposed in IOJK and during this period, the India government had taken illicit steps towards bi-furcating the territory, placing it under Union control and ultimately introducing the New Domicile Rules. Proposed amendments in Jammu and Kashmir Development Act would turn the entire region into a military establishment, he added.
The president said that privileged special status and exclusive rights to permanent residence, acquisition of property, education and livelihood of Kashmiris had been revoked making way for non-Kashmiris to come and settle in the state which eventually would change Kashmir’s Muslim majority demography into a minority.
After the introduction of the New Domicile Rules, Kashmiris had been displaced, dispossessed and disenfranchised within their own homeland, he said while adding that 32,000 non-state Indians had been given domiciles which was lebensraum and irredentism on the part of India. Under the garb of the cordon and search operation, hundreds of Kashmiris had been martyred since the lockdown had been imposed in IOJK, the president mentioned. He expressed his gratitude to the international media, world parliaments, diaspora community and the global civil society for raising their voice in favour of the Kashmiris.
