135 militancy-related, cross-border shelling cases cleared for compensation

Around 135 cases related to militancy incidents and cross-border firing were cleared for compensation, relief and employment in Jammu and Kashmir's Rajouri district, a government official said today.
The cases were cleared at a meeting of district level coordination cum screening committee (DLCSC) chaired by District Magistrate, Rajouri, Shahid Iqbal Choudhary, the official said.
Senior Army, BSF, police and civil officers attended the meeting, approving compensation in 17 pending cases of militancy-related incidents pertaining to various years from 1998 to 2011.
The committee approved employment in favour of 12 cases and cash compensation of Rs four Lakhs in remaining five cases, the official said, adding with this all the militancy related cases have been settled in the district.

Twenty-eight cases approved earlier by the committee for payment of cash compensation were decided to be submitted to general administration department in view of reluctance of next of kin for receiving cash compensation.
The families of the victims are demanding government jobs instead of cash compensation, the official said. He said the meeting approved compensation to victims of Pakistani shelling along the Line of Control (LoC) as per norms.

These included one death case, six injured, 51 cases of houses damaged and 33 cases of livestock killed due to cross-border shelling, the official said.
The official said most of the cases were either pending for want of minor formalities or rejected earlier for shortage of documents which the officials processed as per decisions of DLCSC, the spokesman said.

Meanwhile, the official said that the district magistrate provided Rs 20,000 cash award to section officer relief and equivalent amount for lower staff in view of exceptional work for clearance of all the pending cases.