The civil society and business community have said that the Peoples Democratic Party- Bharatiya Janata Party (PDP-BJP) regime is leaving no stone unturned to fulfill the agenda of extremist Hindu organization, Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS) in the territory. According to Kashmir Media Service (KMS), the civil society members and business community unanimously called the extension of Collection of Statistics Amendment Bill-2017 by India as another nail in the coffin of Article 370 of Indian Constitution that grants special status to Jammu and Kashmir. The Bill recently passed by the Indian Rajya Sabha, the upper house of the Parliament, will empower the government of India to directly collect data from occupied Kashmir.
"It is a ploy directed from Nagpur by RSS and implemented by BJP and PDP to take away our special status," said the Chairman of Kashmir Economic Alliance, Muhammad Yaseen Khan. He said that the puppet administration claims that the legislature of the territory has special powers but here they are not even consulted and the bill is passed by BJP-led regime in India. He added this bill is another deceit after implementation of Goods and Services Tax regime which eroded the special status.
Member of civil society group, Kashmir Centre for Social and Development Studies, Shakeel Qalander, said that the extension of Statistics Amendment Bill to Kashmir was a direct attack on residual powers of the territory. "We don't know what mischief they are trying to play, but the passage of this bill will make a ground for them and you don't know to what extent they would use this bill to weaken our special status," Qalander said, adding that earlier collection of data was in concurrent list, but now without informing anybody, they have extended the bill to Kashmir with a mala-fide intent.
The President of Kashmir Chamber of Commerce and Industries, Mushtaq Ahmad Wani said, "We saw it with GST how they forced it upon us by arresting business leaders and now this law of allowing Indian government to collect data is another thing being done." President of Kashmir Traders and Manufacturers Federation, Bashir Ahmad Rather, said the PDP, for power, is bartering the special status of Kashmir. "First they did it with GST and now Statistics Collection Bill (2017)," he said.
The Co-chairman of Kashmir Economic Alliance, Farooq Ahmad Rather, said PDP is responsible for all the mess. "It is their responsibility to halt such moves, but instead of preventing dilution of special status, they (PDP) are abetting it," he said. Meanwhile, the Communist Party of India Marxist (CPI-M) leaders, Muhammad Yousuf Tarigami, Yousuf Tarigami in a statement in Srinagar has termed the application of Collection of Statistics (Amendment) Bill to the territory as unconstitutional and a big blow to Article 370.
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