PDP wants the trade to continue but the BJP wants to close it, traders tell visiting Congress leaders
Outside the Hari Niwas guest house, a group of Cross-LoC traders on Sunday told Congress leadership they are so frustrated with frequent summons to New Delhi, Lucknow and Nagpur by the National Investigation Agency (NIA) investigating terror funding cases that they will soon be forced to leave the trade.
“We are not against investigation. Let there be an investigation. But it costs us a huge amount of money as we are being summoned week after week to New Delhi, Lucknow and Nagpur. We don’t say investigation shouldn’t be carried out but do it in Srinagar”, the Cross LoC traders told Congress leader and former Chief Minister Ghulam Nabi Azad after meeting the Congress policy planning group headed by Manmohan Singh. Azad was taking note of everything the traders were saying and was asking counter questions as well.
The traders told the former Chief Minister that when the Cross-LoC trade was started in 2008, it was projected as biggest ever Confidence Building Measures (CBM) between India and Pakistan. “We were 750 enlisted traders doing Cross-LoC trade but due to the policies of successive governments and suspicion generated around the trade, we are now only 35 traders doing the trade”, the traders said. They said earlier the trade was exempted from the tax and it was duty free but now the rules of the trade have been drastically changed and they are being heavily taxed.
However, the traders say their main worry is continuous raids of the NIA at their houses. “We are traders. We are not terrorists. If you want to investigate the cases, do it but do in Srinagar. We can’t afford to be in different States after every 15 days or a week,” the traders said. They alleged during the NIA raids even ration cards, medical prescription of their family members, and “other irrelevant” things are being confiscated. “Mobile of every family member is being taken away”, they alleged.
They asked Azad that if the alleged harassment continues they would be forced to leave the trade in October. “The government should clearly tell us whether they want the trade or they want to close it,” they told Azad. “The PDP wants the trade should remain open but the BJP wants to close it. And we have been caught between these two political parties”, they said. To this Azad quipped that both the PDP and the BJP are the two sides of the same coin.
The cross LoC trade was started as biggest CBM by New Delhi and Islamabad on October 21, 2008. The barter trade is conducted for four days a week i.e. Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday and Friday from Chakan-da-bagh-Rawalakote route in Jammu and Salamabad-Chokoti in Kashmir.
Both sides have constructed Trade Facilitation Centres, around 5 km inside the LoC. In Jammu and Kashmir, one TFC is at Salamabad in Uri in North Kashmir Baramulla district and second is at Chakandabagh at Poonch district of Jammu. The trucks have permit to enter up to the TFC where the goods are unloaded and the trucks return. The goods are then reloaded onto local trucks for onward journey.
However, over the years, the trade has come under the police radar. Like in February, 2015 trade between two sides was suspended after Jammu and Kashmir police arrested a driver from PoK. The police claimed the driver was carrying 305 pockets of brown sugar weighing 12 kg in his truck. In January 2014, trade was suspended for more than three weeks as police claimed of arresting a driver from PoK for carrying drugs worth Rs 100 crore. The drugs were to be sent to trader in Punjab. In August 2013, police said it recovered cocaine worth Rs 10 crore from a truck, plying on Srinagar-Muzaffarabad route, at Sheeri in Uri sector.