Himachal guv launches rail track cleanliness drive

Himachal Pradesh governor Acharya Devvrat on Saturday launched a cleanliness and conservation drive from here of the Kalka-Shimla rail line. The centuryold rail line is a 96-km narrow gauge railroad built to ferry Europeans to and from this hill town — then the summer capital of British India.

High court acting chief justice Sanjay Karol accompanied Devvrat and jointly launched the inaugural drive of the Unesco World Heritage site by removing trash. The Himachal Pradesh state legal services authority organised the campaign.

Dineshwar Sharma, the centre's Kashmir interlocutor, is a key voice in determining New Delhi’s policy in the troubled state. He was the man behind government's decision to withdraw cases against stone-pelters. In an interview with HT’s Rajesh Ahuja ,even as it becomes clear that this summer in the state could be the worst in recent years in terms of violence, Sharma defends the decision to withdraw cases, but admits that the sentiment of young people in Kashmir is negative right now. Edited Excerpts:

Do you think the government adopted a soft approach against stonepelters by taking back cases against them?

The situation in Kashmir is very complex and difficult. There is nothing like soft and hard approach. The withdrawal of cases against firsttime stone-pelters was on my recommendation. I take full responsibility for this.

In Kashmir, there are thousands of students and young people who got involved in stone-pelting cases and majority of them were involved only in one case and many of them date back to 2008. Recruitment to militancy is mainly from these stone-pelters who are frustrated and angry, having lost hope of any positive direction in their career and life.

Our criminal justice infra- structure in Jammu and Kashmir is incapable of handling so many cases. The result has been continuous accumulation of cases without a final outcome. My recommendation for withdrawal of cases against first-time stone-pelters was an attempt to wean away young people from the path of violence as we cannot leave thousands of them vulnerable to exploitation by separatists and militants.

But don’t you think that the withdrawal of cases has emboldened the stonepelters?

One can argue that withdrawal of cases against first-time stone-pelters encouraged and emboldened the stone-pelters.

I have checked from J&K Police that informed me that none of the stone-pelters covered under Amnesty Scheme are involved in fresh incidents of stone-pelting, nor any of them have joined militancy.

I look at positive side of this decision that it has helped in reforming thousands.

After the decision was announced in November last year, there was visible positive sentiment in Kashmir. Winter tourism also improved. However, we could not sustain the momentum and over the last two months the sentiment again started deteriorating due to some factors.

When our young children go astray, don’t we try to bring

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