Jammu and Kashmir Government today assured the Centre that it will soon acquire land for creating "composite townships" for displaced Kashmiri pandits in the Kashmir Valley.
The assurance was given by state Chief Minister Mufti Mohammed Sayeed when he called on Home Minister Rajnath Singh here for the first time after taking oath on March one this year.
Sayeed informed the Union Home Minister that his government "will expedite the return of Kashmiri pandit community to the Valley with dignity and honour as the cultural milieu without them remains incomplete," a state government release said here.
Earlier, a Home Ministry spokesman said Singh had asked Sayeed to provide land in the state for composite townships for Kashmiri pandits and the Chief Minister "assured the Union Home Minister that the State Government will acquire and provide land at the earliest."
The issue of return of nearly 62,000 families of Kashmiri pandits, who had to leave the Valley after in the wake of militancy more than two decades back, was in the Common Minimum Programme (CMP) of the BJP-PDP alliance in the state.
"Protecting and fostering ethnic and religious diversity by ensuring the return of Kashmiri pandits with dignity based on their rights as state subjects and reintegrating as well as absorbing them in the Kashmiri milieu.
"Reintegration will be a process that will start within the state as well as the civil society by taking the community into confidence," the CMP had said.
Singh had written a letter to the previous Omar Abdullah government which was followed by another communication to state Governor N N Vohra asking for identification of land for such migrants.
At present, there are about 62,000 registered Kashmiri migrant families in the country, who have moved from the Valley to Jammu, Delhi and other parts of the country after the state was rocked by militancy in 1989.
During the budget for 2015-16, Rs 580 crore has been earmarked by the Centre for rehabilitation of migrants.
Later, Sayeed met Union Minister for Consumer Affairs, Food and Public Distribution Ram Vilas Paswan and raised the issue of shortage of food-grains and requested for allocating ration to the State as per Census of 2011.
The Chief Minister urged the Union Minister for allocating food-grains on the basis of "No-Profit No-Loss", which is reflected in the CMP of the coalition Government in the State.
Presently, ration is distributed in the state on the basis of 2001 Census.
Paswan assured the Chief Minister that he will expeditiously pursue the matter of allocating food-grains to State as per 2011 Census, the state government said.
