A team from the Ministry of Development of North Eastern Region (DoNER) on Thursday began travelling to different parts of the country in a bid to replicate the north-east development model in Jammu and Kashmir.

DoNER Minister Jitendra Singh, during an official programme in Guwahati on Wednesday, said the team’s tour was decided after studying the development model of the north-eastern States. “In the last five years, the north-east has shown that development can go hand in hand with the assertion of region identity,” he said.

“Now that Article 370 has been abrogated, Jammu and Kashmir will now get an opportunity to replicate the north-east model of development,” he added, claiming that Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s focus on far-flung areas of the country had impacted the north-east to a large extent.

The Hindu

By withdrawing the special status of Jammu and Kashmir, the government has thrown more fuel on an already volatile situation, and with one spark, the blaze could spread, says Nazir Ahmed Laway, Rajya Sabha member of the Peoples Democratic Party.

Mr. Laway spoke to The Hindu as the clampdown in Jammu and Kashmir completed a month. It has also been a month since Mr. Laway and his party colleague Mir Mohammad Fayaz walked out of Parliament tearing a copy of the Constitution.

‘Very limited contact’

The last time he went to Kashmir was two months ago, between Parliament sessions, and since then, Mr. Laway said, he had had very limited contact with the Valley. “For the past 30 years, the situation in Kashmir has seen violence, and with the latest move to dilute Article 370 and Article 35A, the government has only added more fuel on the already volatile situation. It only needs a spark and we don’t know who all will be caught in the blaze,” Mr. Laway said.

He said the PDP had never supported violence. “Mufti saab [Mufti Mohammad Sayeed] used to say that Kashmir’s children should be saved. We have never supported violence. Our slogan has always been ‘dharne se nahi, goli se nahi; baat banegi sirf boli se’ (‘Neither protest, nor bullets; Kashmir can be saved only through talks’),” he said.

After a month of being cut-off from the State, he has been receiving intermittent calls from the State for the past two days, but he cannot place a phone call to anyone there since incoming calls are not allowed. “I am a Parliament member, but even I can’t call anyone in Kashmir,” he said.

‘Help Kashmiris’

From August 5, he has not tried to travel to Kashmir, saying he would be detained just like any other political leader. “I am able to help Kashmiris staying outside it [the State],” Mr. Laway said.

Mr. Laway said the man on the street did not adequately know Kashmir’s history. “We were free long before India won its freedom,” he said.

“Leaders who trust the Indian Constitution and democracy — they have been put behind bars. If the government has detained separatists, no one would have shed tears. Why arrest those who worked within the Constitution,” Mr. Laway asked.
Mr. Laway and Mr. Fayaz’s Rajya Sabha terms are scheduled to end in February 2021. “My trust in the Indian Constitution is firm and I will continue as a parliamentarian till my term ends. It is an important platform to raise the grievances of Kashmiris, and I shall continue to do so,” Mr. Laway said.

His decision to stay on in Parliament is contrary to the directions given by PDP chief Mehbooba Mufti. Ms. Mufti had asked PDP Parliamentarians to quit the post before she was put under house arrest.

Via The Hindu

SRINAGAR, SEPTEMBER 05: Department of Administrative Reforms and Public Grievances (DARPG) will be collaborating with the J&K Government to implement e-office in Civil Secretariat, improving public service delivery and strengthening of the grievance redressal mechanism in Jammu and Kashmir among other good governance initiatives.

Advisor to Governor, K Skandan and Chief Secretary B V R Subramanyam today discussed the DARPG collaboration roadmap with the visiting team of DARPG headed by Additional Secretary, Ministry of Personnel, PG & Pensions, DARPG, V Srinivas at the Civil Secretariat here.

Principal Secretary, Planning Development and Monitoring Department, Commissioner/ Secretary, School Education, Commissioner/ Secretary, Information Technology, Secretary, Department of Rural Development and Panchayati Raj, Secretary, GAD, Secretary, ARI & Training Department, Joint Director, J&K IMPARD and other senior officers were also present in the meeting.

Srinivas gave a detailed presentation on the areas of specialization of DARPG and the proposed engagements of DARPG with the J&K Government. He said previously DARPG has also collaborated with the state in projects like Visitor Management System in Civil Secretariat, E-Assembly and the ongoing automation of Jammu Development Authority and now DARPG is looking ahead to collaborate with J&K Government in initiatives like E-Office in Civil Secretariat, Pension And Pensioners Welfare, CPGRAMS, strengthening of J&K IMPARD, capacity building training programmes, conferences/ seminars on good governance and documentation of governance success stories.

He said that after assessing the priorities and the requirements, a roadmap will be finalized within the next two weeks and shared with the J&K Government, for which they will again visit the state later this month.

Advisor Skandan urged DARPG to conduct an assessment of the various e-service initiatives of the J&K Government so that these can be further improved.

Regarding Grievance Redressal, Chief Secretary observed that similar to CPGRAMS; J&K has a robust grievance redressal mechanism in place wherein public grievances are received and uploaded on the online Grievance Redressal Portal and being resolutely monitored by the
Governor’s Grievance Cell till their redressal/closure. However, Government would like to see it strengthened further with support of DARPG.

SRINAGAR, SEPTEMBER 05: The Government today restored landline services across the Kashmir Valley.

The landline services were restored in a phased wise manner giving much needed relief to people.

Bangalore : The draconian communication blackout in Kashmir is an outrageous protracted assault on the civil liberties of the people of Kashmir, said Amnesty International India as it launched a global campaign today in a bid to highlight the human cost of the lockdown.

“The blackout has now been a month old and cannot be prolonged any further by the Indian Government as it has grossly impacted the daily lives of Kashmiri people, their emotional and mental well-being, medical care, as well as their access to basic necessities and emergency services. It is tearing families apart,” said Aakar Patel, head of Amnesty International India.

In response to this indefinite communication blackout, Amnesty International India has launched the campaign #LetKashmirSpeak on 5 September, 2019 – which marks a month of the communications blackout, to ask for immediate lifting of the lockdown. While landline telephones have been announced to be restored, their obsoletion in the recent past will fall woefully short in facilitating communication for the 8 million people of Kashmir.

“While the region of Jammu has begun to see easing of the lockdown in many districts, most of Kashmir still remains under a severe communications blackout. Depriving an entire population of their right to freedom of expression, opinion and movement for an indefinite period is akin to taking the region back to the dark ages. ‘Naya Kashmir’ cannot be built without the Kashmiris. The country is yet to hear from Kashmir after a month of being repeatedly been told by the Indian government that all is normal. This is not normal. Let Kashmir speak,” said Aakar Patel.

On 2 September 2019, the Indian Minister of External Affairs, S. Jaishankar in an interview with Politico Magazine said, “It wasn’t possible to stop communications between militants without impacting all of Kashmir. How do I cut off communication between the terrorists and their masters on the one hand, but keep the Internet open for other people? I would be delighted to pass on the information.”

While Amnesty International India acknowledges that the Government of India may have legitimate security concerns which may merit reasonable restrictions on right to freedom of expression in certain circumstances, it does not believe the current shutdown complies with requirement of necessity, proportionality and legality set out under Article 19 of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, to which India is a party. Instead, it deprives the entire population of Kashmir of their right to freedom of expression and opinion and access to crucial information, thus inflicting a form of collective punishment on the 8 million people of Kashmir. Lack of transparency on the criteria used to cut off all communication services and what mechanisms are available to challenge the sweeping restrictions puts India in a clear violation of its international obligations.

Meanwhile, sketchy reports coming out of the region have highlighted unattended medical emergencies, mass arrests and detentions, children and youth being picked up in the middle of the night, torture of civilians, indiscriminate use of tear gas, rubber bullets and pellet guns at protestors. All this with the backdrop of heavy military presence and a history of serious human rights violations in the region. This adds to the heightening of tensions and feelings of insecurity at a time when families are unable to contact each other and ensure their wellbeing – as many young and aged remain locked in their homes.

The attempts to restrict the freedom of press, like in the case of journalist and author Gowhar Geelani who was arbitrarily stopped at the Indira Gandhi International Airport, New Delhi from boarding his flight to Germany, have further compounded the effect of the communication blackout. According to a recent Kashmir Press Club statement, at least three senior Kashmiri journalists were asked to vacate government accommodations as soon as possible, which is ‘nothing but harassment aimed at coercing journalists to toe a particular line’. The government’s attempts to create a public opinion of ‘normalcy’ in Kashmir while curbing the freedom of independent press have usurped the voice of the people.

This excessive censure has not only affected the public’s right to know and threatened basic freedom of expression norms but also put the lives of journalists, health practitioners and service providers at risk, increasing their chances of being harassed, intimidated and detained in connection with their work.

“Given the chronic impunity for abuses committed by security forces in the past in Kashmir and a lack of unconditional and unconstrained access to the news from the valley, the situation calls for lifting of the communications blackout without any further delay and to listen and engage with the people of Kashmir. This is no more a clampdown on just the communication systems of Kashmir, but a clampdown on the hearts and minds of the Kashmiris,” said Aakar Patel.