Author: IANS
Publication: Thaindian.com
Date: September 13, 2009
URL: http://www.thaindian.com/newsportal/india-news/kashmiri-pandits-in-exile-to-tonsure-head-in-delhi_100246886.html
Twenty years after the first ever killing
of a Kashmiri Pandit by militants in Jammu and Kashmir - which triggered the
community's exodus from their ancestral homes in the valley - some members
living in Delhi will tonsure their heads Monday to protest their "exile".
"On Sep 14, 1989, militants killed a
Kashmiri Pandit in the heart of Srinagar. This sowed the seeds of our eviction
from our homeland. We are protesting the completion of this tragedy by tonsuring
our head," Kamal Hak, a Kashmiri Pandit "living in exile" in
Delhi, told IANS.
"Nearly two dozen people will tonsure
their heads and hundreds will gather near river Yamuna to mark our protest,"
said Hak, who along with his wife had left their home in the Kashmir Valley
way back in 1990.
He said around 80,000 Kashmir Pandits are
"living in exile in Delhi and its suburbs and all of them have expressed
solidarity with the initiative."
Pikalal Taploo, a lawyer, was the first Kashmiri
Pandit victim to terrorism.
"He was killed by terrorists right outside
his house. After his death, hundreds of Pandits were killed by terrorists
within the next four years. Post-1993, the number of killings has fallen as
the majority of us have left the valley for other cities," Hak added.
