Frustrated residents of a village in Uttar Pradesh's Kanpur district have come up with a unique way to protest against the absence of basic facilities. Simmranpur natives have renamed their village as Pakistan-occupied Kashmir (PoK) stating the living conditions in the village are similar to PoK.
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Simmranpur is located in Daulatpur Ghatampur of Kanpur. The locals said the village is deprived of basic necessities like water and electricity. The village has no proper roads, school or a dispensary.
The only hand pump in the village stopped functioning about eight years ago.
Though the villagers have reached out to BJP MLA Abhijeet Singh Sanga, no action was taken. Earlier too, the villagers raised the issue with SP MLA Munidra Shukla, but to no avail.
Tired of the long-standing neglect, the village-- which comprises of 800 people-- reached a decision on June 8 after much deliberation and put up placards stating the village has been renamed as Pok.
"We will keep referring to the village as PoK till the time electricity, water and proper roads are made available to us," read the hand-written placards.
"We have been reading in newspapers about PoK and its people living in servitude and neglect. Our condition is no different," Sonu Yadav, one of the campaigners, told the Hindustan Times.
Though politicians have asked the villagers to remove the placards, the Simmranpur natives are standing their ground.
The plight
"The electricity poles in the village, which do not have wires, were erected by a contractor from his own resources when he was contesting the panchayat election in 2008. Electricity has not been made available in our village in the last 70 years," said Vinay Mishra, a resident.
The villagers have also put up posters at temples, walls and outside the village and at the house of the village pradhan in Daulatpur. Surprisingly, the Simmranpur village also falls under the Daulatpur gram panchayat but unlike Simmranpur, Daulatpur has all the facilities including a school and a water tank.
"Development ends at Daulatpur and surrounding villages. It never reaches us. The MPs, MLAs and village headmen generously release funds for these villages but not ours," said another villager Brijesh Singh.
To add to their plight, the person who runs the ration shop in the village refuses to give kerosene even to the 30 ration card holders of the village. "We don't have electricity and we will not get kerosene too," said Mishra.
To worsen the matter, girls from other villages refuse to marry the men from the Simmranpur village owing to its poor living conditions.
