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JAMMU & kAshMir

Why PoK brides youth have since been disal- she says and I can’t even go.
But the wives of these
Shahnaz is also concerned
Want to go bacK? lowed to return to Pakistan about her ailing husband
and PoK, even on an oc-
Mohammad Yusuf Bhat.
casional visit. They com-
“What will happen to me if
These women complain that they are treated like plain of having no travel something happens to him”.
documents and also that
But this is a fate that has
criminals in Kashmir even though they are not their children are not being already befallen Sumaira
infiltrators or intruders, writes riyaz wani admitted in local school as who lives in Shopian. Su-
they hail from the other part maira and her two sons
his group of to return without arms of Kashmir. and three daughters were
women in Kash- and resume normal life. There are women like denied the share in property
mir occasionally Government had selected Shahnaz and Raheela who after her husband’s death.
holds protests four entry points — Poonch- are without documents and She got it only after the
T in Srinagar, the Rawalakote (Poonch), Uri- can’t visit their families. In villagers intervened on her
last such protest was held Muzaffarabad (Uri), Wagah case of Shahnaz, her father behalf.
on February 3 on the eve of (Punjab) and Indira Gandhi in PoK passed away two Also, many of these
the Prime Minister Naren- International Airport, New years ago, but she says that women live in miser-
dra Modi’s visit to the state. Delhi from where the youth she learnt about it one year able conditions after being
Their demand: “send us back could enter the state fol- after the death. divorced by their husbands.
to our families in Pakistan lowing necessary clearance. “Now my mother is ill,” This has left them without
and Pakistan Occupied any property and docu-
Kashmir”. ments. According to an es-
The women came to timate, around fifty of these
Kashmir in the years after women have been divorced
2010 as part of the rehabili- by their husbands. One of
tation policy announced by them is Posha who lives at
the then state government Handwara in a rented room
for the Kashmiri youth who with her three children
had crossed over to Pakistan after being divorced by her
or PoK for arms training husband Abdur Rashid. She
and wanted to return to has now approached the
a normal life in the state. office of the office of Muslim
These women are the wives personal law board to plead
of these former militants. her case.
In their protest they carried The women have ap-
banner which read in Urdu proached Kashmir’s grand
“We’re Pakistani. Send us mufti Nasir-ul-Islam to
home”. seek his intervention on
They complain they are their behalf. So far, seven
being treated like criminals divorced women have ap-
in Kashmir even though But after the 2014 takeover The wives of proached Mufti Nasir which
they are not infiltrators of the BJP government at has left him worried. He has
or intruders. One of them the centre, the plan was all former militants urged the state government
Kubra Gillani, 27, who hails but shelved. This, despite complain of to consider the cases of
from Domel area of PoK the fact, that the then Chief these women on compas-
has been divorced by her Minister Mehbooba Mufti having no travel sionate grounds. He wants
husband Muhammad Altaf who headed a coalition documents and the government to either
Rather. government with the BJP send these women back
Around 450 youth had had suggested “legalis- also that their to Pakistan or rehabilitate
returned, many of them ing Nepal route” for those children are not them properly “as envis-
with their wives, under Kashmiri youths who have aged originally under the
the rehabilitation policy. now shunned the path of being admitted rehabilitation policy”.
The state government had violence and wished to
opened “channels” for them return to their homes. in local school letters@tehelka.com

Tehelka / 30 april 2019 39 www.Tehelka.com