Lockdown in Kashmir makes Jammu business suffer

“The biggest fallout of 370 is in Jammu. The taxi business has failed, hotel – failed, transport – failed, tourism – failed,” says a businessman in Jammu.

He seemed to have a point as a four-member team of concerned citizens comprising a psychiatrist and writer from Ludhiana (Anirudh Kala), a public health professional and academic from Mumbai ( Brinelle D’souza), a Delhi based journalist (Revati Laul) and the founding trustee of Anhad from Delhi (Shabnam Hashmi) found out that they were the only occupants in the hotel they put up in Jammu.

The Hotel-Ashok—had 45 rooms and most of the rooms would normally have guests around this time of the year, the hotel staff maintained.

“We had 25-30 tourist buses going every day to Kashmir. Now there’s no one to take tours. Not one bus is going out,” said a transporter.

Another transporter claimed that before August 5, as many as 500 trucks would load goods at the railway station and transport them to towns within a 50-kilometre radius. Each of these trucks would make a trip a day. But now they are making one trip in four days.

Transport is a ₹35,000-crore business in Jammu, they said.

While people they met in Srinagar and Baramulla were angry, bitter and vocal, the team found that people in Jammu were reluctant to speak. Half the people they contacted in Jammu refused outright to even meet them. Several people they approached were scared of giving their opinion even anonymously.

Unlike the Kashmir valley, Jammu was not in a lockdown. There was no civil disobedience. Landlines, mobile networks and Wifi connections were working although the Internet was working at an abominably slow speed. A file that took three minutes to transfer in Delhi, took the better part of the night in Jammu.

The symbiotic trade between Jammu and Kashmir is disrupted since half or more of buyers, suppliers and transporters in Jammu were dependent on Kashmir.

Some transporters also admitted that there is a deepening rift between transporters in Kashmir and Jammu. There is an unwritten rule now in Kashmir that any vehicle coming from Jammu should not be entertained.

The President of the Commerce and Trade Federation of Jammu did a press conference a month ago, asking for the restoration of communication in Kashmir and safe passage for transporters. “but no one heard us.”

“I have a garments business. It’s at zero right now. I have three months’worth of payments pending from Kashmir. That’s not happening. 50% of my business is with Kashmir,” admitted another businessman.

Discordant voices even in Jammu question the wisdom behind abrogation of Article 370. “Under Article 370, what was left of it after all these years? Protection for domiciles from outsiders being able to buy land. Now the BJP is saying they will restore that …so why did they revoke it in the first place?” is a question the team heard asked in Jammu.

Earlier, whenever there were threats from militants, there would be partial shutdowns affecting trade and commerce. This time the Government has ensured a complete shut-down.

“Kashmir has had one eye taken out; Jammu has had both eyes removed,” summed up a transporter before adding, “the next set of people to commit suicide will be transporters”.