KASHMIR, INDIA, October 26, 2005: Forced to flee their homeland by the outbreak of terror, thousands of Kashmiri Pandits residing in the national capital have also lost what were their homes with the October 8 killer earthquake having razed their ancestral houses in the affected zones. “We will return home some day” was the thought that crossed the minds of nearly 300,000 Kashmiri Hindus when they were driven out of their state way back in 1990. “Hundreds of thousands of Pandits who had left behind their ancestral homes in places like Uri and Tagdhar (in India near the line of control with Pakistan in Kashmir) have lost property and land,” said, Romesh Raina, General Secretary of the Kashmiri Samiti, a representative body of migrants. Sunil Shakdher, President of the Samiti says that neither the state nor the central government have approached them regarding the property loss of families from the worst affected areas of Uri and Tangdhar. The silence of both governments clearly indicates that the Pandit families, largely residing here in relief camps for the last 15 years, have now clearly lost their identity, Shakdher said. However, the Pandit families here and all over the state have come together to pool resources to aid the quake victims in Jammu and Kashmir. They are understood to have garnered an amount of US$2.3 million. After living as refugees for the last 15 years, the Pandits fear that when the actual estimated loss to property comes in, with their houses gone, the land may be reclaimed by other parties.
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