Gilgit-Baltistan's exploitation leads to uncontrollable street protests: Report
Apr 25, 2023
Gilgit-Baltistan [PoK], April 26 : The exploitation of Gilgit-Baltistan has led to uncontrollable street protests since December 2022. The people have gone so far as to voice reunification with India seeing Indian Kashmir's progress and fast-paced developments, The Pakistan Military Monitor reported.
Locals are enraged because GB-based power plants supply electricity to all provinces in Pakistan, thousands of kilometres away; but GB does not see the light of a glowing bulb.
GB is not even compensated for its resources in any manner by the government sitting in Islamabad, dominated by Punjab.
Punjab, rather than showing benevolence, has decided to torture them further. Every year GB received 1.6 million sacks of wheat from the Punjab province at subsidized rates. This time they decided to cut the wheat quota to 1.4 million sacks and reduced the subsidy. The GB population was guaranteed the food grain; it's the only thing they asked for in return for selling or pawning off everything they own but per usual, the government did not keep its word, according to The Pakistan Military Monitor.
The Pakistan government has decided to further push the GB citizens into a debt trap by imposing new tax laws. The laws faced a lot of backlash during their introduction in 2018 because GB was guaranteed tax amnesty by Pakistan from the beginning.
Female education is at its all-time low and no corrective measures are being taken by the government. The federal government had promised schools, universities, and medical colleges to GB but to date, they have not materialized, according to The Pakistan Military Monitor.
The healthcare system in GB is also a mere joke. There are 120 union councils in GB, all lacking well-trained maternity nurses and health workers. Most people do not have the bandwidth to go to bigger cities for healthcare.
