KV Network

The real face

The real face
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In a place like Kashmir people always flow with the tide. We are in the habit of listening to people who do not matter at all or who are based out there to mislead the people on various counts.

One such example being that a section of the people in Kashmir is quite upbeat over the developments that are happening in eastern Ladakh. These happenings are in no way going to benefit the people here as the country and its people which is at the centre stage right now has been involved in worse forms of acts that puts humanity to shame.

The Chinese governments have been notoriously infamous for dealing with its minorities including the Uighurs. Various draconian measures have been enforced to impose various curtailments and restrictions on the minority and most of these have gone unreported.

One such measure that has been taken is an attempt by the Chinese government to slash birth rates among Uighurs and other minorities as part of a sweeping campaign to curb its Muslim population. Though the same government is encouraging some of the country’s Han majority to have more children and people are being provided incentives for that.

While individual women have spoken out before about forced birth control, the practice is far more widespread and systematic than previously known. What is most worrying is that the state regularly subjects minority women to pregnancy checks, and forces intrauterine devices, sterilization and even abortion on hundreds of thousands, in order to control the birth rates among them.

This inhuman act that is now being put into place is in addition to the already strict measures including mass detention both as a threat and as a punishment for failure to comply with curbing the population.

Having too many children is a major reason people are sent to detention camps in various areas where the Uighurs are putting up.

Ironically, birth rates in the mostly Uighur regions of Hotan and Kashgar plunged by more than 60% from 2015 to 2018, the latest year available in government statistics. Across the Xinjiang region, birth rates continue to plummet, falling nearly 24% last year alone compared to just 4.2% nationwide, statistics show.

The hundreds of millions of dollars the government pours into birth control has transformed Xinjiang from one of China’s fastest-growing regions to among its slowest in just a few years.

Under China’s now-abandoned ‘one child’ policy, the authorities had long encouraged, often forced, contraceptives, sterilization and abortion on Han Chinese. But minorities were allowed two children three if they came from the countryside.

But the eased restrictions are not being implemented on the community that has been facing various threats for their religious beliefs.


KV Network

Kashmir Vision cover all daily updates for the newspaper

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