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Still The
Outsider Hindu Singh [ Over
1,00,000 Hindu oustees from Sindh in Pakistan, who were forced to migrate to
Rajasthan, still have to cope with being branded ‘Pakistani’ ] The
first major influx of refugees from Pakistan happened in 1971 during and just
after the Indo-Pak war. That is when I also came. Some refugees had moved in
earlier, just after the 1965 war. But it was in 1971, that a large chunk of
Hindus from Pakistan came over to the Indian side while the Indian army
retained capture of a 50 kilometres area in Sindh, Pakistan. This was a
Hindu-dominated area of Sindh from where people migrated to India. According
to the Simla agreement of 1972, India had agreed to send them back, hence the
government policy until 1978 remained ambivalent. With
the coming of the Janata regime in 1978, especially under the stewardship of
the then external affairs minister, Atal Behari Vajpayee who extended support
to the refugees and their cause, by staging a symbolic protest on the border,
things gradually changed. Refugees
kept coming in waves for the next eight years. Until 1978 or so, there were
as many as 25-30 camps for Pak oustees in Barmer district alone. Soon,
however, these camps had to move away from the border areas as Hindu or not,
these videshis carried the Pakistani label and it was felt that it was unsafe
letting them reside in the border districts of Barmer, Bikaner and Jaisalmer.
Today most of them are settled in Jodhpur and Jalore in Rajasthan, caught
between two warring neighbours, still the outsider. Most
of the refugees from Pakistan, over 1,00,000 of us totally face our fair
share of problems here. Pehle to Pakistani hone ka thappa (firstly it is the
branding of being a Pakistani), that makes it difficult to function or even
relate to people. Secondly,
it is the denial of basic human rights that are part of the UN charter to
people who have no nationality. India has simply failed to tackle the question
of rehabilitation seriously. It is not as if money has not been earmarked;
large sums of money have been budgeted from state funds, from central funds
from the World Food Organisation, they just do not percolate down to the legitimate
recipients Thirdly
is the crucial question of caste. Most of the migrants belong to the
scheduled tribes, the Bhil tribe, who have been working as bonded labour in
the Sindh region enjoying no protection from the law; they are poor and
illiterate. Out of
a total of 1,00,000 Pak ousters residing in India today, as many as 8,000
have no citizenship. Many of those who have been denied citizenship due to
bureaucratic |
insensitivity
are second or third generation migrants, some even minors. The
PVS is the only organisation formed by the ousters, fighting for nationality
through mobilization, lobbying and advocacy. We are at present, through the
PVS, contemplating filing a PIL (public interest litigation ) in Indian
courts to demand citizenship for third generation migrants who have been
denied their nationality. Apart from the obvious rehabilitation provisions that do not percolate down to the migrants is the real question of zameen, cultivable land. Some of those allotted land do not either have proper ownership or are condemned to hold poor land. Nearly all of them are in debt to local banks. Ironically, in 'Muslim' Pakistan the procedure is much simpler. I am talking about Hindu girls who marry into Hindu families and have gone across to Pakistan; within one year to eighteen months their application for a Pakistani visa receives clearance! Here in India, however it can take decades! Since
1971, the maximum displacement is out of the Thar Parker region in Sindh
(Pakistan), a region that ironically experienced no communal tension in 1947.
The major reason for the displacement is the impact, down the line of the
ideology of the Pakistan state that Pakistan is a ‘Muslim’ state, the feeling
among the refugees who flow in to Rajasthan is, ‘‘Hamara mulk ab hamne rakhne
kabil nahin raha’’ (Our country is not capable/fit to keep us any more). Initially
we received maximum support from the BJP as a political party. After
the initial interest taken by th BJP leadership, however, the Pak oustees are
today caught in a no-win situation. Today the BJP takes for granted that
those who have got Indian nationality are ‘natural BJP voter’ because they
harbour anti-Muslim sentiments and the rest of the 8,000 are not voters, so
who cares! It was
the present home minister, in 1998, L.K. Advani, who took a keen interest in
the problems of Pak oustees and had even taken steps to grant nationality to
19 pending cases who had been living in India isnce 1965. The request for
nationality has to travel from the district level via an application made by
the DM to the state home ministry, then to the Union home ministry before it
is finally ‘cleared’. The
Congress has never taken an interest in the issue of Pak oustees, believing
that these are BJP supporters anyway!! As far as we are concerned, each one
us, today living in India, the feeling of having fled from our watan, our zameen
never leaves us. Yeh
mulk ki paribhasha to pachas saal ki hai (the discourse of nationhood and
country’s 50-odd years old). It is partition that has uprooted us, if
partition had not happened, our displacement would not have taken place. [Courtesy
: Communalism Combat] |