Kashmir suffers as Jammu blocks supplies

SRINAGAR: Cooking oil wholesaler Ajaz Ahmad Baig is not taking phone calls for the last few days. Not because he owes money to anybody but his stocks have run out.

Baig has been repeatedly calling his supplier in Jammu, but “he simply refuses to send goods till the land is restored to the Shri Amarnath Shrine Board (SASB)”.

This is not an isolated case. The people of Kashmir in general are bearing the brunt of the Valley’s economic blockade by pro-Amarnath land protestors in Jammu. Desolate faces in the long queue at a petrol pump near Tatoo Ground sum it up.

“I have sold all the 600 cooking oil canisters I had. I tried to contact my distributor in Jammu, but he plainly refused. I am not the only one who has run out of stocks,” Baig said.

For the last few days, protestors in Jammu and Samba have been enforcing an economic blockade of the Valley. Several vehicles have been set ablaze, some have been looted and others are waiting for the police and army to escort them to safety.

The agitators are not allowing goods trucks to cross or leave Jammu for Kashmir to put pressure on the government to restore 39.88 hectares of land to SASB. Though the army has cleared the Srinagar highway, sufficient supplies are not reaching the Valley.

The Srinagar-Jammu-Pathankot highway is the only road connection between Kashmir and the rest of the country. It is the lifeline of Kashmir as most supplies come through this route. Kashmir’s fruit growers and handcraft exporters heavily depend on this highway.

“We spend around Rs100 crore a month to buy important consumer goods from other states. But now we are running out of stock. Our stocks will last only a week, the government’s promises are an eyewash. Only yesterday a truck carrying carpets was looted by rioters at Lakhanpur,” Jan Mohammad Koul, president of Kashmir Traders Federation, said.

It is not only the imports that have taken a hit, exports, particularly fruit, have also suffered. Fruit growers say they have suffered losses to the tune of Rs125 crore due to decay caused by delay in dispatch.

“We do not know how many fruits have rotten in trucks stranded on the highway,” Ghulam Rasool Bhat, chairman (transport) All Kashmir Fruit Growers and Dealers Association, said. The fruit growers have set an August 7 deadline for the government to clear the highway, otherwise they would march on the cross-LoC Srinagar-Muzaffarabad trade route.

h_ishfaq@dnaindia.net