NEW DELHI, May 12 (UPI) -- Indian President A.P.J. Abdul Kalam has said efforts will be made for the return of Kashmiri Hindu minorities to the disputed Kashmir province.
Kalam was speaking to a delegation of the All India Kashmiri Samaj, an organization which represents the Kashmiri Hindu minority, who had called on him to appraise him of the dangers what they called the continued "pan Islamic" conspiracy to wipe out Kashmiri Hindus and other minorities from the province.
"The president told the delegation that the problems of Kashmiri pundits would also be looked into," said Shiban Dudha, a senior leader of the Kashmiri minority.
The delegation attributed the Doda massacre earlier this month, in which 32 Hindus were killed, to the lopsided policy of the federal and provincial governments towards Kashmir, and urged Kalam to intervene to prevent an exodus of Hindus from the province.
The pro-Hindu outfit said members of village defense committees should be provided advanced training and sophisticated arms, and far-flung villages should be given more security.
"Return of real peace in the valley had to precede any talk of the return of the pundits," the delegation told the President, explaining that while the Kashmiri Hindu pundit community lived like refugees 17 years after leaving the valley having been targeted by militants, the government had not declared them as such.
Until peace returned to the valley, the delegation argued, the government should create political space for the pundits by nominating them to federal and provincial cabinets.
