(This story originally appeared in on Mar 21, 2022)

With the exodus of Kashmiri Pandits back in discussion, a private member bill in the coming days is set to urge the government to ensure rehabilitation of the community in the Valley without delay, with a focus on restoration of encraoched properties and providing a large security and employment umbrella to encourage their return.

The Kashmiri Pandit (Recourse, Restitution, Rehabilitation and Resettlement) Act, to be introduced by Congress MP Vivek Tankha in the Rajya Sabha, may test the BJP government, as it seeks expert committees to issue a white paper on the atrocities and plight of Kashmiri Pandits till now, and an enquiry commission to look into the “genocide” and “mass exodus”.

While the white paper, to be compiled by a panel headed by a retired Chief Justice of India, will also cover the eight years of BJP regime at the Centre and its earlier government in the state, the enquiry commission is bound to look into the 1989 period when the exodus took place under the VP Singh government which was supported by BJP. The governor in J&K then was Jagmohan, a BJP loyalist. Both the issues have figured prominently in Congress’s response to BJP’s attack on rivals over the Kashmiri Pandits exodus.

Tankha’s bill seeks to institute an elaborate infrastructure to facilitate the return of Kashmiri Pandits to the Valley, with a focus on security, heavy investments for promoting entrepreneurship among families who return, quotas for education and jobs, and a monthly family support for them. Above all, it wants the community to be declared a “minority” under the National Commission for Minorities Act.

The bill wants restoration of the property of Pandits that has fallen to encroachment. It says that all the property sale after 1989-90 should be declared “distress sale” which is null and void, and restored to original owners.