Jammu:
Laba Ram cannot contest, or even vote, in state assembly elections in Jammu and Kashmir, but he is in the fray for the Lok Sabha polls as the joint candidate of the refugees from west Pakistan and Pakistan Occupied Kashmir.
Laba is among the refugees who face a peculiar problem, and he has entered the Lok Sabha polls as a contestant to get their predicament resolved. As a refugee from Pakistan, he is not entitled to apply for a "State Subject Certificate." But as his family has been living here since Independence, he has been recognized as a citizen of India. And as a citizen, he can contest Lok Sabha polls.
For them, the key election issue is the acceptance of their demand for the status of state subjects.
"We have been living here for the last 66 years and this is what we are getting in return, our third generation is facing worst problems, we have formed a refugee united front, and have fielded our own contestant so that we get justice," says Laba.
About one lakh refugees migrated from Pakistan to Jammu after partition. They cannot buy property or get jobs in the state. No government has ever taken steps to remove their plight.
But now the BJP has made the rights of refugees a big election issue. Narendra Modi raked up the issue in his rally in Jammu last month. "In our country Bangladeshis get the right to vote and the citizenship of this country, but those dying and living for this country, the west Pakistani refugees, who call themselves the sons of the country, have not got this right, I want to fight for them," the BJP's prime ministerial face said.
"Our children have no use studying. Neither can we buy land, nor can we get jobs, we only work as labourers," rues Reeta Kumari, a refugee living in the Muthi area of Jammu.