For the first time since the eruption of militancy in the Valley, north Kashmir’s Kupwara district will see a strike over an unusual issue: the government’s “discriminatory policy” and unemployment. A day-long bandh has been called on Monday by a people’s committee, which has brought legislators across the ruling coalition-opposition divide together.

According to a report filed by the Jammu and Kashmir Government’s General Administrative Department in 2005 before the Sachar Committee, the representation of the state’s majority community in the government is 2.8 per hundred population while the minority representation is 4.8 per hundred. The majority community in J&K comprise the Muslims.

Anger over this “discrimination” in representation in government jobs has been brewing, and is now threatening to push the state to the brink of another flashpoint.  

The upheaval in the frontier Kupwara district has been triggered by the implementation of a new recruitment rule, which allows a candidate to apply only in one division for a divisional-cadre post. At the same time, the rule mandates that district-cadre posts do not remain limited to educated candidates of that particular district but those from other districts can also compete. The applicant has to be a permanent resident of J&K, though the rule doesn’t specify the domicile requirements.

Since the new recruitment law came into effect on October, 13, 2004, what this has meant is that officials recruited by the government in the Kupwara district, that ranks at the bottom among J&K districts in the human development indices, have come from outside the region. This includes teachers and other subordinate service officials. PDP legislator Abdul Haq Khan points out that the new rules put Kupwara youths at a natural disadvantage as the limited educational avenues available in the district don’t prepare youths for recruitment exams.

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