There are varied reports coming in media about the actual loss suffered by the Kashmir economy during the current lockdown.
For a landlocked economy like Kashmir these are huge numbers. During the last eleven months every business of almost every hue and type has been shut. The cottage industry, the IT start ups, and the tourism have all had a sort of perennial downtime since August 5 last year. Kashmiris are moving out of state in droves for the Indian metropolitan cities to land themselves in any entry level jobs. The crisis is worst for married middle-aged people who shun their start ups in Kashmir to look for jobs in mainland India. The age is usually against them and they struggle to even bag an entry level job.
The longest high speed internet shutdown has ensured that even the most optimistic of IT start ups have surrendered to the fact that till the situation normalizes and there is a tangible solution at hand business would not be business as usual for Kashmir.
A loss of billions of US dollars has put Kashmir economy in dire straits. The Indian establishment at center needs to do a serious round of funding to compensate for the losses suffered by Kashmir economy.
It just cannot go on forever. The homesick Kashmiris in Bengaluru, Mumbai, Chandigarh, Delhi, Hyderabad and other Indian cities had invested all their money to launch these startups but due to the current situation they are moving back that too with empty hands.
A clear indicator of which way the Kashmir economy is going!
