Click to play videoKupwara (Jammu & Kashmir): Time stopped for Shahmaal and her children 12 years ago, when her husband, Ali Mohammad Sheikh was killed in a shootout with the security forces.
Because her husband was a terrorist, Shahmaal is not entitled to relief given to the families affected by violence.
"As of now, it is possible for me to work so I can fend for these children, but once I can't work, these children will have work on their own and feed themselves," Shaamaal says.
There are thousands of widows like Shahmaal and many more orphans living similar lives in the Kashmir Valley.
A survey by a Srinagar-based NGO, Jammu and Kashmir Yateem Trust, in 2003 said that there were 7,000 widows of terrorists and there were about 15, 000 orphans in Kashmir.
Three years later, the numbers have gone much higher but the state government has no relief plans in place for them.
However, Deputy Chief Minister of Jammu and Kashmir, Muzzafar Hussain Baig, says, "Once terrorism ends and there is peace and normalcy then all people of Kashmir whoever they are, will be taken care of."
The People's Democratic Party, which forms t he coalition government in the state alongwith the Congress, had promised to address the issue during the last state elections.
However, they did not fulfill the promise.
The Centre may be making efforts to woo alienated terrorists and incorporate them into the mainstream society again, but scores of widows like Shahmaal and hundreds of orphans here continue to live a life of stigma.
It is high-time that the Centre rethinks its policy and provide these people, the required relief.
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