Jammu and Kashmir government to rehabilitate stone pelters

Jammu, March 19 : The Jammu and Kashmir government will frame a policy to rehabilitate stone pelters in the valley.

According to official sources, the policy seeks to provide employment opportunities to the youth.

Chief Minister Omar Abdullah also confirmed that such a policy was in the offing when he told the state assembly late Wednesday that stone pelters were "our boys" and they would be rehabilitated.

He also promised that they would be released and handed over to their parents and elders of their locality who have assured the local police that, in future, they would not indulge in such acts.

Official sources disclosed that they would be absorbed in government jobs or given money and land for setting up self-income generating units, like kiosks in Srinagar and elsewhere in the valley.

Stone pelters have become a persistent headache for the government as they have disrupted day to day life in the valley and have projected Kashmir as a land of stone throwers. Some of them were booked under the Public Safety Act, a strict law that enables the police to arrest a person and keep him in jail without any trial for a year.

Last month, an 11-day-old infant died in his mother's lap when stone pelters targeted the car in which the family was travelling in Kashmir's Baramullah town.