MIRPUR (AJK): Speakers at a Kashmir seminar held on the sidelines of the 52nd session of the UNHRC in Switzerland’s city of Geneva, late Thursday, vehemently condemned the insidious land-grabbing campaign and dislodging common Kashmiris from their properties in the international-recognized Indian-occupied Jammu Kashmir State, terming it a part of the Indian government’s settler colonialism policy to reduce Kashmirs to second class citizens in their own homeland.
The seminar titled “Indian settler colonialism and great land grab in Indian occupied Kashmir”, was attended and addressed by renowned human rights activists, international law experts and representatives of different rights organizations hailing from different parts of the world, including Robert Fantina Writer and Human rights activist from Canada, Marry scully Rights Activists from USA, Syed Muhammad Ali, security and international relations expert from Pakistan, Hassan Bana senior APHC leader, Dr Saira Shah, assistant prof, MUST, Ahmed Qurashi the renowned journalist while Dr Waleed Rasool, moderated the event, says a message reaching and released to the media here on Friday.
Highlighting the different dimensions of the Indian settler colonialism policy, the speakers, while expressing their grave concerns, stated that after abrogating article 370 and 35A, the Modi government has launched a double-edged onslaught to dis-empower the indigenous population both politically and economically.
They said that under a well thought out policy, the majority community, which happened to be Muslims, were being marginalized and dispossessed from their lands.
Referring to the massive land grab campaign going on in the region since the last several years, they pointed out that millions of acres of land, including agriculture and forest land, was already under the illegal occupation of the Indian army and paramilitary forces.
They observed that the change in the constitutional status of the state was purposely made to grant the Indian government the much needed political and legal leverage to bring material change in the region through the wholesale extermination of the indigenous populations.
Speakers said that the marginalisation of the majority population in Kashmir, policies of land grab, wholesale extermination of the locals, exploitation of natural resources, rampant aggression, arbitrary arrests, forced disappearances and systematic genocide of Kashmiri youth by the Indian forces were obvious manifestations of the racist regime’s apocalyptic vision and its bias towards Kashmir and Kashmiris.
Underlining the Modi government’s dangerous designs, the speakers regrettably noted that the current dispensation in India viewed settler colonialism as a final solution to the Kashmir dispute.
“The most worrying change has been the amendments to the Jammu and Kashmir Development Act that gave sweeping powers to the Indian Armed forces”, they said, adding that by virtue of this law the Indian army can take possession of any land of choice in J&K after declaring it “strategic.”
Further changes to land laws, which dealt exclusively with the sale and purchase of land, they said have resulted in the further marginalization of Kashmiris.
The speakers also voiced their concern over the ongoing house demolishing drive, land eviction, confiscation and attachment of civilians’ properties by the Indian occupation authorities.
They said that on the one hand, the Indian government was hell bent on depriving Kashmiris of their possessions, while on the other, the political marginalization of Kashmiris continued unabated.
Granting voting rights to non-state subjects, they said, was yet another atrocious assault on the political identity of the Kashmiri people.
The move, they said, would drastically change the region’s political landscape besides influencing the outcome of election results in the future.
Political marginalization of the majority community, they said, was something the RSS and other right wing warriors had been dreaming of.
