Pakistan has turned Gilgit-Baltistan into the most neglected area of South Asia, says a new book

 

 

However, nearly seven decades of Pakistan's illegal occupation has pushed Gilgit-Baltistan — once an economically thriving region — into the most neglected, backward and poorest area in entire South Asia, says a new book titled 'Pakistan Occupied Kashmir — Politics, Parties and Personalities' by three Pakistan experts.

Other experts not connected to the book say Islamabad has also been systematically suppressing the people of the region who are mostly Shias and are facing an influx of Sunni population from other parts of Pakistan.

Tilak Devasher, a strategic affairs expert, says while Pakistan has projected itself as the champion of self-determination' and democratic rights in J and K, the reality is that in Gilgit Baltistan, it has indulged in "systematic suppression of the people".

"It has denied them even basic constitutional and legal rights but hypocritically speaks of the right of self-determination in J and K," he told PTI.

The region, part of erstwhile Jammu and Kashmir before being occupied by Pakistan in 1947, is now synonymous with increasing suicides, sectarian violence, violation of human rights and militancy. Awfully, 85 per cent of the people make their living on subsistence farming, says the book published by premier think-tank Institute of Defence Studies and Analysis.

According to a report by the Islamabad-based Pakistan Institute for Peace Studies, the region has a literacy rate of mere 14 per cent for men and 3.5 per cent for women. However, the book says, data prepared by the government of Gilgit-Baltistan in 2013 claimed that the literacy rate was 37.85 per cent in 1998 and it went up to 60 per cent in 2013.