Hizbul’s posters in Govt offices scared Census staff away

KRALPORA, SEPT 18: As part of its drive to ban census operations in Jammu and Kashmir, the Hizbul Mujahideen, besides issuing press statem...

KRALPORA, SEPT 18: As part of its drive to ban census operations in Jammu and Kashmir, the Hizbul Mujahideen, besides issuing press statements warning state government employees not to participate in the process, is pasting letters on government offices and directly asking employees not become partof the process.

It was the Hizbul Mujahideen letter pasted at the main gate of Zonal Education Office here which made employees return the material they had received to carry out the census and boycott the process. Syed Haq Nawaz, District Magistrate of Kupwara, admitted that the letters pasted by militants created a scare among employees and disrupted the second phase of census operations.

Abdul Ahad, a teacher of Kralpora Zone, said when they were coming outfrom the office of the Zonal Education Officer after attending ameeting, they saw a letter from the Hizbul Mujahideen pasted at the the door of the office, warning teachers not to violate the organisation’s ban on the census.

Written in Urdu, the letter warned teachers “to keep away from census operations. It added that teachers “should not do any such thing which takes their lives”.

The state government employees in Kupwara and Handwara tehsils have completely boycotted the census operations. Tehsildars of both tehsils have written to census authorities that no employee turned up for duty.

However, the authorities maintained that the census operations aregoing on in Tehsil Karnah and Keran, Machil areas close to Line of Controlin Kupwara tehsil.

Karnah, Machil and Keran areas are least affected by militantcy as they are virtually under the Army’s control. The people of these areas arealso dependent on the Army and a majority of the men are working portersand coolies in the Army.

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Reacting to census operations in Karnah which were carried out despite theban, Hizbul has asked their cadre in Kupwara district to stop the process.

Officials said the census faced bad weather in the district only afterthe Hizbul started implimenting the ban on ground level and localcommanders of the outfit intimidated the employees.

Even after the Hizbul ban, the employees in the district deputed for censusduties had recieved all relevant material and were ready to start the census. However, renewed threats by the Hizbul forced them to return the material and boycott the census.