20 yrs on, 3429 youth missing in JK: Govt

State has 26355 widows, 8612 orphans
Courtesy: Daily Rising Kashmir dated August 27th, 2009 by Abid Bashir
Srinagar, Aug 26: The government Wednesday revealed in Assembly that 3429 youth have gone missing in the State since 1990 while the number of orphans and widows stands at 26355 and 8612 respectively. The figures were given by the government in a written reply to a question posed by PDP MLA from Shopian, Abdur Razak Zawoora.
While releasing the figures, government said 3429 youth have gone missing in the State from 1990 till July 2009. “Of these 1062 disappeared from Kashmir while 2367 went missing from Jammu region”. About the number of widows and orphans, the government said there were 8612 widows and 26355 orphans in the State. “Of the 8612 widows, 2267 were the widows of militants, who were killed in different encounters and other incidents while 6345 women lost their husbands to different violence related incidents. Of the 26355 orphans, 20976 lost their family members to violence during the turmoil while 5379 were kins of slain militants.” In the written reply, government stated that the figures about orphans and widows came to fore after a survey was conducted by the Rehabilitation Council to ascertain the number of widows and orphans in the State. “Anganwadi workers supervised by supervisors were part of the survey conducted by the rehabilitation council, which worked under Social Welfare department”.The figures about missing youth were attributed to the home department and not to the survey. To a question posed by the MLA whether government had taken any step to rehabilitate the violence affected victims, the government said, “The rehabilitation council has been rehabilitating the victims of violence in various ways. Widows are getting Rs 750 as monthly pension since April 4, 2008. Besides, the government is also paying marriage assistance to young widows, who want to re-marry.”Talking to Rising Kashmir Minister of Social Welfare, Sakeena Itoo said the Social Welfare department provides marriage assistance not only to the young widows but to the daughters of widows who have attained the marriage age. “All widows collect their monthly pension through banks and as far as the marriage assistance is concerned, once the family is identified, we pay them through cheques,” she said.She said the government also pays scholarships to school going orphans. “In cities, Rs 800 are being paid as scholarships to the school going orphans,” the minister said.About the number of jobs provided under SRO 43 since 2003, the government said 3919 people have been provided the jobs. “Of these, 1116 people were provided jobs in Jammu while 2803 youth got jobs under SRO43 in Kashmir,” the government said adding, “1354 job applications under SRO 43 were pending”