The Srinagar-based CRPF helpline ‘14411’ has been re-activated for people in Kashmir, who require help for their families, seeking to check their kin’s well-being and talk to them or are in distress, after the decision to abrogate provisions of Article 370 in the valley.
However, few Pakistani’s who have been thrown completely off-balance after India’s bold decision to bifurcate Jammu and Kashmir and revoke Article 370 in the valley, have been using the ‘madadgaar’ helpline number to vent out their disgruntlement. According to reports, some Pakistani’s have been calling up the helpline number and hurling abuses at the CRPF personnel.
According to the Times of India, a total 7,071 calls have been received on CRPF’s ‘madadgaar’ helpline between August 11 and 16 to inquire about the well being of their kins based in Kashmir. Out of the total, 171 came from outside India and 2,700 from families of security personnel deployed in the state.
The maximum calls received were from Kashmiris living outside the state (2,448), while 1,752 calls were made by non-Kashmiris based outside Kashmir. Amongst these, as many as 45 calls were received from Saudi Arabia. While most calls were from family members seeking information about the well being of their families, few also requesting to talk to them, there were few Pakistani’s who also called.
While some Pakistanis inquired about their families members, few embittered ones abused the security personnel over the Kashmir issue.
Calls were received from 22 countries in all, including 39 from UAE; 12 from Kuwait; eight each from Israel and Malaysia; seven from Russia; six from the US (New York) and Turkey; five from Australia; four each from UK, Singapore and Bangladesh; three each from Canada, Bahrain, Germany, Philippines and Thailand; two each from Oman, France and Belgium; and one each from China and Qatar.
A senior official from the Jammu and Kashmir administration told the Times of India that he too had received calls from Pakistani numbers. Some genuinely inquired about the well being of their family members, but some called just to hurl abuses at the Indian authorities and armed forces.
Immediately after India’s historic move to strip Article 370, which granted a special status to Jammu and Kashmir and a subsequent bill aimed to bifurcate the state into two Union Territories, Pakistanis on Twitter couldn’t stop themselves from expressing the devastation that swept them following India’s audacious move.
A large number of Pakistanis, who had no idea what was transpiring back in India were taken aback by the government’s decision to do away with the partition relic of Article 370 and proceed in the direction of greater assimilation of the state with the Indian Union. Dejected Pakistanis took to Twitter to lament about India’s dare-devilry vis-a-vis Kashmir.
