Not successful in ensuring return of Kashmiri Pandits: Omar

Jammu and Kashmir Chief Minister Omar Abdullah today expressed regret that his government had not been successful in ensuring return of Kashmiri Pandits to the Valley, and vowed to regenerate a "sense of security" among them so that they willingly go back to their homes.
At a youth convention of displaced Kashmir Pandits, the Chief Minister said "nobody can forcibly take you back to the Kashmir Valley", but "we (the people in the government) want to give you the sense of security."
"...You have left homes in lakhs. The return of 50 to 100 people that too on employment, cannot be called as return. We cannot pat our backs on that," Omar said, adding that "Kashmir is incomplete without Kashmiri Pandits".

"You (Kashmir Pandits) have been forced to leave the Kashmir Valley. Nobody can deny it. You were snatched of the sense of security (in Kashmir). Nobody can forcibly take you back to the valley," Omar said at the convention of the Youth All India Kashmiri Samaj (YAIKS) at Patta-Bohri in Jammu.
"...We can only give you a sense of security, and it is endeavour of me and my colleagues that we want to give you the sense of the security. But we have not been successful in this so far. The day I feel that I have done something with regard to it, I will feel I have the right for your honour of a traditional cap," he said.

Omar was replying to the demands of the return of the Pandits to the Valley, the passage of Kashmiri shrines and temples bill in the Assembly, and an employment package for them, as raised by YAIKS chief R K Bhat.

The Chief Minister said consensus in taking such a decision is very difficult and the majority view should be the guiding principle in this regard.
"We always keep saying that Kashmir is incomplete without Kashmiri Pandits. Well said Nasir Aslam Wani (NC leader) that a garden is not a garden which does not have different kinds of flowers..." Omar said.

To prove his point, Omar said, "In Srinagar's Tulip Garden, there is only one type of flower. There are tulips in March and from April it is closed and rest of the year, nobody comes there. Compare it with Shalimar, Nishat, Chashma Shahee and other Mughal gardens, where there are tulips, roses, and other kinds of flowers...There is beauty with mountains in background. This is the situation of the Kashmir Valley.