Kashmiri Pandits continue to flee Jammu and Kashmir amid wave of targeted killings

People from the Kashmiri Pandit community shout slogans during their protest march against the killing of the school teacher Rajni Bala. Credit: PTI Photo

Notwithstanding government assurances of secure accommodations and postings, Kashmiri Pandits continue to leave the Valley in the backdrop of rise in targeted killings of civilians in recent weeks.

Sanjay Kaul, a government teacher, living in Vessu transit accommodation in south Kashmir’s Kulgam district since 2010 said that hundreds of Pandits have left for Jammu since last month.

“Among around 3000 Pandits living in Vessu, half of them have fled to Jammu in recent weeks,” he said.

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Anil Raina, another KP said that it was not possible for the government to guard them all the time. “We have to travel from our accommodations to offices, have to go to the market, take children to schools and go to hospitals for ailments. How is it possible for the government to provide security at all places for all the people?” he asked.

Raina said that it was better for the government to allow the KPs to move out till the situation normalizes in the Valley.

On Friday morning, militants shot dead Vijay Kumar from Rajasthan, a bank manager of Elaqai Dihati Bank in Kulgam. Later in the evening, a labourer from Bihar working at a brick kiln was shot dead while another was injured in a similar attack in central Kashmir’s Budgam district.

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On May 31, a non-Muslim female teacher was shot dead outside her school in Gopalpora, Kulgam. Earlier on May 12, a KP employee was shot dead by militants inside a government office in tehsil office Chadoora in Budgam district.

Avtar Krishan Bhat, president of Veervan Pandit Colony in north Kashmir’s Baramulla, said that out of around 300 families of the employees living in the district, half have fled after recent targeted killings.

He said that their main demand was re-location outside Kashmir for which protests were being held across Kashmir by the Pandit employees and their families. “Government is not interested in fulfilling our demand, so we have called off protests and asked the families to leave the Valley,” he added.