Tsering Angmo's rise in life was phenomenal. Hailing from the tribal region of Ladakh, Angmo became a firebrand activist involved in all major social and political battles of the '70s in Jammu and Kashmir. The gutsy woman inspired an entire generation of Ladakhi women.

Today, Angmo seems to have lost her own personal battle -- for the restoration of her basic right of citizenship. Now serving as director of All India Radio at Leh, Angmo is not even entitled to own a house legally at her native place. Her fault: marrying an `outsider,' from Uttar Pradesh.

An archaic law which is brazenly discriminatory against the women of Jammu and Kashmir stands in Angmo's way to own property in the State. Called the State Subject Law, it was framed in the times of the Maharajas to check the illegal trafficking of women to Punjab. It deprives a woman citizen of the undivided Jammu and Kashmir State, of her basic citizenship rights in case she marries a non-State subject. She may lose a government job; she can't apply for admission to professional colleges and she can by no means acquire any property in the J&K territory.

On the other hand, if a male citizen marries even a foreigner, the spouse automatically becomes a citizen of Jammu and Kashmir. But a woman marrying someone from some other Indian State loses her right to be called the `daughter of the soil'.

The Permanent Resident's Certificate (PRC) of a woman citizen is valid only till her marriage after that she acquires a fresh certificate. (Each resident of J&K is supposed to possess the PRC, a mandatory document for acquiring property or getting jobs in the government).

The law already stands challenged in the Jammu and Kashmir State High Court. Rubina Malhotra, a gynecologist, took up cudgels on behalf of Kashmiri women when she was debarred from joining her post-graduation course in medicine on the grounds that she was married to an `outsider'. Amarjeet Kour of Baramulla in Kashmir filed a similar case when her relatives tried to deprive her of ancestral property since she was married to a Punjabi. In fact, a bunch of petitions by women have been awaiting judgement by the High Court for past 13 years.

This issue has already become a point of debate among political parties. The BJP and other `ultra-nationalistic' parties are on the women's side although for furthering their own thesis that Jammu and Kashmir needs to be integrated fully with the Indian mainstream. They are, however, pitted against the formidable `sub-nationalistic' force the National Conference (NC) which is opposing the women's demands tooth and nail. The NC's paranoia is a result of the mindset that such a change in law would open floodgates for outsiders to settle in the State. The standard reply from the NC headquarters about the move against the law is: ``It is a move to undermine the special status of Jammu and Kashmir.''

Women's groups ridicule such claims and allege that there is a deliberate campaign by the `men in power' to link `a women's issue' with sensitive ones like `special status of Jammu and Kashmir'. Professor Nirmal Kamal of the Economics Department of the Jammu University says: ``The State subject and several other laws in Jammu and Kashmir violate the basic fundamental right of women of the State and there is nothing sacrosanct about these.''

Legislator Mehbooba Mufti, a law graduate herself, however, is defensive on this issue. ``I think, we should not change the law for it will have a bearing on the special status our State enjoys under Article 370 of the Indian Constitution,'' she says.

Since few women are active in Jammu and Kashmir politics today, issues related to women are often relegated to the backburner. For example, facilities for birth control are banned by militants and anything perceived to be linked with religion becomes sacrosanct and a taboo to talk about. Similarly, women in the Jammu region are facing domestic violence due to increasing consumption of liquor. Ladakh alone remains the redeeming face of the State in women's movement. The local Autonomous Hill Council took a great leap forward when it decided to give joint ownership rights to couples on the barren land along Igufe canal in Leh.

Copyright © 1997 Indian Express Newspapers (Bombay) Ltd.