November 29, 2020 6:16:23 am
A security staff stands guard at a polling station in Pahalgam as voters queue to cast their votes for the District Development Council elections. (Express photo: Shuaib Masoodi)
The link road connecting the Kotgarhi panchayat in Akhnoor tehsil of the Jammu district with the main Akhnoor-Jourian road is in ruins. However, Pritam Lal, a refugee from West Pakistan, has still traveled to cast his vote and elect his representative for the first Jammu and Kashmir District Development Councils (DDC).
“I have come to cast my vote because it makes me feel that I also matter in Jammu and Kashmir,” he said, adding that although his family has been living in Jammu for 73 years, they had no right to land. “At least now my four children, all of whom are graduates but are still unemployed, can now apply for a government job in the Union Territory,” he said.
Lal was accompanied by his nephew, Mangat Ram, a Seema Suraksha Bal (SSB) staff. The 31-year-old had left his marriage ceremony midway to cast his vow. “My ancestors longed for this privilege and now when I have this opportunity, I must cast my vote,” Ram said.
Like Lal and Ram, many West Pakistani refugees along with Gorkhas and Valmikis living in two DDC districts in Jammu district, Maira Mandrian and Bhalwal Brahmana, were casting their votes in local body polls for the first time.
Before the repeal of article 370 on August 5, 2019, these people, although they lived here for generations, could only cast their vote in the Lok Sabha elections.
In Sohal panchayat, Kaku Ram took his 100-year-old mother, Ambo Devi, to vote. Their village, Kangral (Nud), does not have a pucca road and the promised bathing plan has not been implemented. However, he hoped that the DDC elections would give the elected members of the local body the authority to start development works.
“Today is a historic day, as Hindu-Sikh refugees from Pakistan, together with Valmikis and Gorkhas, are exercising their right to vote for the first time in 73 years,” said Hari Om, a retired professor at the University of Jammu.
© The Indian Express (P) Ltd
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