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"It is reason's pride to face reality when the
garment of make-believe has been stripped away"
Kashmir Valley, the hub of present terrorist turmoil, is the most prosperous region of the country, where per capita income is far too higher than in any part of the country and much more above the national average. It is here that peasant proprietorship is the rule rather than an exception, where education is free from primary to university level, where loans or financial assistance from the Government agencies and commercial banks can be had for a song, sans worrying for ever about its repayment; where the central assistance on a per capita basis is the highest in the country and where the Central Government has always been very liberal to bestow grants and aid. The Valley, which only a few decades back, used to export labour to the plains in hordes, is now net importer of labour especially from Bihar and other states of the country. The saga of sudden change from rags to riches in a few decades, is a landmark unprecedented in the annals of the subcontinent's history and must be seen to be believed.
The population of Kashmir Valley is around 30 lakhs (3 million) just equal to that of Trans-Yamuna area of Delhi. For this small population, there is a silk factory, one of the biggest in the world and also many smaller silk factories. There are woollen mills, big and small and flourishing carpet factories, electronics goods and industries, stainless steel and leather factories, fruit processing industries, H.M.T. Watch factory, Indian Telephone Industry (ITI), cement factories, petroleum processing units. Besides, there are large number of medium and small-scale industries both in government and public sector.
Kashmir University has all the disciplines in Science, Arts, Commerce, Law and Humanities besides exhaustive courses for languages. There are a number of separate colleges for women. A Regional Engineering College, one Government Medical College and one private Medical College are also there. There is a separate Dental College. A prestigious Institute of Medical Sciences (like A.I.I.M.S., New Delhi) has been established in Srinagar. There are a number of Teachers' Training Colleges, Technology and Engineering Institutes and other professional institutes in the Valley.
Kashmir Valley has a full fledged Agricultural University and large number of research laboratories for silk, wool, rice, mulberry, drugs etc. There is hardly any sphere of activity, which the Central Government has undertaken either by itself or through the State Governments, which has not been sponsored in the Valley. There has been three times increase in Central assistance to Kashmir in the plan period 1984-89, which is not the case in other states. Similarly, per capita expenditure on development activities in J&K is Rs.962/- as against Rs.270/- in Bihar, Rs.490/- in Gujarat and Rs.822/- in Himachal Pradesh. Per capita consumption of electricity is much higher than in other states.
People in Kashmir Valley have been provided for the last 45 years, subsidised cheap food (perhaps cheapest in the world), subsidised firewood, subsidised salts, subsidised pesticides for orchards, subsidised agricultural pursuits, cheaper feeds for animals, liberal loans for training in professional colleges outside the state (never returned), huge subsidies for establishment of industrial units, liberal loans for housing and what not. There is hardly any sphere of life where people of Kashmir did not get preferential treatment.
Author:Shri Dinanath Raina
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