Amit Shah Made Several Assertions In Jammu. At Least 7 Of Them Are Untrue Or Half-Truths

Prabodh Jamwal

Union Home Minister Amit Shah, in his address at a public meeting in Jammu on Tuesday as a last-ditch effort to garner votes for BJP candidate for Jammu-Reasi Lok Sabha constituency, Jugal Kishore, made several assertions.

At least some of them were half-truths or untruths. Here are seven of them:

1. Shah said that the regional parties in J&K have always insulted the Dogri language and did not respect Maharaja Hari Singh. But the Modi-government has declared a holiday on his birthday as a mark of respect to the Maharaja. When Atal Ji became prime minister the Dogri language was included in the eighth schedule and Modi Ji made it the official language.

Fact: Dogri was included in the Eighth Schedule of the Constitution of India in December 2004 though the decision to include four languages including Dogri was taken in 2003. Subsequently, Bodo, Dogri, Maithili and Santhali were added in 2004.

2. Amit Shah claimed it was an achievement of the Modi government that Toll Tax Plaza at Lakhanpur has been abolished.

Fact: Though the Lakhanpur Toll Tax Plaza was abolished on January 1, 2020, two new Toll Plazas have been erected between Jammu and Lakhanpur, at a distance of 94 kilometers. The people travelling between Lakhanpur and Jammu have to pay Road Tax at two Toll Plazas increasing the cost of travel.

Furthermore, five toll plazas between Jammu and Srinagar have been erected and their rates were revised in 2023 raising the Road Tax for the travellers. The Toll Plaza at Thandi Khui (Sarore) has been abolished but in 2024 but the road tax has been redistributed between Lakhanpur and Ban increasing the cost of travel at two places.

Jammu has been seething with anger over the accumulation of these toll plazas and several protests have erupted in the region in the last few years.

In August 2023, Jammu observed a complete shutdown to oppose multiple moves of the government, which include setting up a toll plaza at Sarore, installing smart meters and introducing property tax.

3. Amit Shah claimed that “NC, PDP and the Congress made democracy defunct in Jammu and Kashmir. They did not allow the Panchayat elections. But Modi Ji has taken democracy to the grassroots by holding Panchayat elections paving the way for 40,000 panchayat members to get elected. They took away your rights and we gave you all the rights.”

Fact: The first Panchayat elections were held in 2000 and the second elections were organized in 2011. But all panchayat bodies were dissolved in 2014 by the central government when the BJP took over the reins in New Delhi.

The next elections were held in 2018-19 after the BJP withdrew its support to PDP-BJP government in June 2018.

Most of the elected Panchayat members were independent because NC and PDP officially boycotted the elections to protest against what they described as the “death of democracy in J&K”.

4. Amit Shah claimed that “Our Valmiki brothers, the women, the OBCs and the Gurjar brothers and sisters too did not get reservations. But the Narendra Modi government ensured justice to all. The NC and the PDP used to create fear about reservations. He said that he announced in the Parliament to ensure justice to Paharis without curtailing the benefits of the Gurjars.”

Fact: According to official data, about 3000 Valmikis have received their Domicile Certificates, which replaced the Permanent Resident Certificate (PRC), commonly known as “State Subject”, giving the minuscule community some benefits.

As for the OBC communities, they enjoyed reservation benefits since 1989 when the reservation policy was amended and put in place.

The BJP extended the reservation under Scheduled Tribe (ST) category to Paharis and some other communities in February 2024, while increasing the percentage of reservations under ST to 10 percent.

However, Gujjars and Bakerwals were never denied reservations in professional colleges, higher education, recruitments and promotions. Besides, they also enjoyed scholarships for pursuing education under the ST category.

The Gujjars and Bakerwals, along with Gaddis, and Sippis, were added to the list of Scheduled Tribes in 1991.

Before 2019, the Gujjar and Bakerwal Welfare Board was a statutory body looking into all the issues concerning the nomadic community. The Gujjar Bakerwal Welfare Board has now been abolished.

5. Shah claimed that women in J&K were not getting the right to inherit their ancestral property. He said that after the removal of Article 370, the women got their rights to inherit property.

Fact: The fact of the matter is that the women’s right to inheritance was never under question since the state subject law was introduced under the rule of Maharaja of Jammu and Kashmir. After Jammu and Kashmir’s accession and introduction of Article 370, the same clauses of state subject law under the monarch were added to the rules regarding Permanent Resident Certificate.

This guaranteed the right to inheritance for all women, including those who married outside. However, since the state subject law did not make a specific mention of such women, there was ambiguity about whether the women marrying outside could retain their PRC.

The question of PRCs to women was settled in 2004 by the Jammu and Kashmir High Court. Article 370 was never a hindrance.

6. Shah claimed that after the abolition of Article 370, terrorism has been eliminated. He said that previously people could not think of organizing big elections or political rallies in J&K but now they can after J&K has been fully integrated with India.

Fact: The number of militancy-related incidents between 2018 and 2023 is more than 800. This includes 625 encounters. More than a thousand militants and 319 security men lost their lives. The number of incidents and the people killed varies due to periodical calculations by different agencies from time to time.

Notably, the number of incidents in the Jammu region, particularly in the Pir Panjal belt has risen. 28 soldiers were killed in J&K in 2023 in 9 fierce encounters in dense forests.

7. Shah also claimed that the people of J&K benefitted immensely after the abrogation of Article 370 and spoke about major development schemes and industrial investments.

Fact: The Home Minister made no mention of unemployment which was considered to be highest in the last 45 years in J&K, as per figures provided by the Centre for Monitoring Indian Economy (CMIE).

The youth in Jammu have staged several protests over repeated leakage of test papers for recruitment in different government departments during the past five years. Instead of fast-paced recruitment in government departments, the process has been slow and tardy, creating frustration among the educated youth.

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