These auctions took place through the Internet. Kashmiri businesspersons were mostly unable to place bids because of the #digitalsiege. Wheels within wheels. Remember that none of the companies squealed that this was happening.
theprint.in/india/outside-…
theprint.in/india/outside-…
Let me also say that the one thing one learns when studying Insurgencies is that if you’re the state you should NEVER start natural resource extraction in a place with insurgencies. It is an easy source of rent for insurgent groups. Really easy.
This is a bad idea. Morally, human rights wise and STRATEGICALLY! This government doesn’t have a clue about strategy wrt conflict zones. They dig communities deeper into conflict.
Most of the land being auctioned is located in high militancy areas of the valley- Bandipora and Pulwama. None of this will be possible without heavy security force protection. Kidnappings for ransom of company officials will certainly happen. They were so common in Assam.
So now you’re going to have the forces acting like private security. CISF is always deployed at such installations, but they lack terrain knowledge here.
So you’re going to have to deepen counterinsurgency just to get these projects moving. That’s a human rights disaster already. I really don’t know what to say except this is such a bad plan.
I don’t think the companies that have bid for these plots know what they’re going to face. This isn’t Chhattisgarh. This is a completely different theater of conflict.
