Leh and Kargil

Leh and Kargil

CONTEXT: Jammu and Kashmir was bifurcated into two Union Territories on August 5, 2019, Ladakh was seen welcoming the reorganisation. In Leh and Kargil, different reasons to oppose Ladakh’s current status

CONCEPT:

• August 2019 changes were immediately opposed by the people of Kargil, where the leaders of the majority Shia population demanded that the district should remain part of J&K, and that special status be restored to safeguard the rights of Kargil people over their land and employment opportunities.
• Opposition from Leh came later. A UT for Ladakh had been a long-standing demand in Buddhist majority Leh, which believed it was marginalised in the larger state of J&K. But what Leh leaders did not bargain for was the complete loss of legislative powers. Earlier, the two districts each sent four representatives to the J&K legislature. After the changes, they were down to one legislator — their sole MP— with all powers vested in the UT bureaucracy. Unlike the UT of J&K, Ladakh was a UT without an assembly.
• Both Ladakh districts fear is that alienation of land, loss of identity, culture, language, and change in demography, will follow their political disempowerment.

Hill Development Councils

Leh and Kargil have separate Autonomous Hill Development Councils, set up under the Ladakh Autonomous Hill Development Councils Act, 1997. However, the AHDCs have no legislative powers. The councils are elected, and have executive powers over the allotment, use and occupation of land vested in them by the Centre, and the powers to collect some local taxes, such as parking fees, taxes on shops etc. But the real powers are now wielded by the UT administration, which is seen as even more remote as the erstwhile state government of J&K.

Sixth Schedule is a provision of Article 224(A) of the Constitution, originally meant for the creation of autonomous tribal regions in Assam, Meghalaya, Mizoram and Tripura. Hill councils under this provision have legislative powers.

The People’s Movement for Sixth Schedule, an umbrella of political parties and religious organisations including the all-powerful Leh-based Ladakh Buddhist Association, put forth its demand for an autonomous hill council under the Sixth Schedule, modelled on the lines of the Bodoland Territorial Council in Assam.