Targeting the government over restrictions imposed in Jammu and Kashmir since August last year, the Congress on Wednesday said the economy of the region has collapsed due to the measures and demanded immediate release of former chief ministers Mehbooba Mufti and Omar Abdullah.
Initiating a discussion on the budgetary proposals anddemand for grants for the union territories of Jammu and Kashmir, and Ladakh,Congress member Manish Tewari urged the government to “open ears” and”listen” to the voices of people as he claimed a “dangeroussituation” is developing there.
Tewari alleged that the decisions of August 5, 2019 toabrogate provisions of Article 370 of the Constitution, which gave specialstatus to Jammu and Kashmir, and divide the state into Union territories, havedemolished the economy.
He said that growth of key sectors, including agricultureand tourism, are declining. “Itwill be better if the budget for Jammu and Kashmir could have been discussed inthe Assembly,” he said, adding the August decisions are a”tragedy” for these union territories.
Citing data of Kashmir Chamber of Commerce and Industry, hesaid there was a loss of Rs 18,000 crore. “…USD 2.4 billion worth ofeconomy was lost after the decision of August 5-6, 2019,” he said, addingagriculture sector has lost Rs 10,000 crore in last seven months.
Similarly, he said, apple farmers earned Rs 6,500 crore in2016-17 and after the imposition of restrictions only 50 per cent of harvestingcould be done.
He said that the tourism industry, which is the biggestafter agriculture, has “totally collapsed”.
Tewari said that tourist flow too has impacted as it wasestimated that about 21 lakh tourists will come to Jammu and Kashmir but tillJuly 2019, the figure was 5.21 lakh.
Over 5.6 lakh jobs are also impacted in the sector and about50,000 jobs are hit in the carpet sector due to closure of restrictions oninternet services.
Noting that maximum budget has been allotted to the homeaffairs department, he said, “…This is an unsustainable model, it willnot work.”
These decisions have not been taken keeping in view”diplomatic” strategies but due to “narrow thoughtprocesses”, he said.
On the abrogation of Article 370, he said the matter issub-judice in the Supreme Court and “I expect a positive result fromthat”.
Tewari said that “one thing is clear” from thesedecisions that “the government want the territory of Jammu and Kashmir andnot the people”.
He said that this decision was implemented by deployingadditional 40,000 para military force personnel, detention of 5,161 people andimposition of the stringent Public Safety Act (PSA) on 609 people.
“We do not know how many people are in jail indifferent parts of the country…I demand from the government to put a listinforming about the number of people from Jammu and Kashmir who are indifferent jails,” he added.
He also said that although Lok Sabha member Farooq Abdullahhas been released, two former chief ministers — Mehbooba Mufti and OmarAbdullah — are still under detention.
“I demand immediate release of two former chiefministers…PSA is completely unconstitutional and I condemn this action of thegovernment,” he said.
He said internet closure of over five months in the unionterritories were relaxed only after the order of the Supreme Court on January10.
However, he said the internet services have not yet resumedcompletely and only 2G services have been started. “We seek detail answerfrom the government on this,” he added.
Intervening, Law Minister Ravi Shankar Prasad said thatmilitants’ use internet to spread fear and threaten people.
Tewari said that militancy is not a new phenomena andprevious governments had dealt with the menace and “this cannot be anexcuse to close internet services”.
He added that closure of the services has impacted childrena lot and as many as 11,308 schools were closed seven months.
“This is a big damage from the government’sdecision,” he said, adding judiciary too has collapsed in the unionterritory and “this is the biggest tragedy”.
He added that since August 5-6, 2019, as many as 459 Habeascorpus petitions are pending. “So what kind of country we want tomake,” he said, alleging courts are not listing these petitions.Further Tewari saidthat now the government seems to realise that the August decision was a”mistake”.