Azad Kashmiri diaspora

Azad Kashmiri diaspora refers to people who have migrated out of Azad Jammu and Kashmir into other areas and countries, and their descendants.

Pakistan

Within Pakistan, Azad Kashmiris have migrated towards many provinces outside of Azad Jammu and Kashmir.

United Kingdom

The United Kingdom is home to one of the largest Mirpuri diasporic populations. Towards the end of the 19th century, Mirpuris started taking jobs as stokers in British merchant navy ships, and acquired an understanding of global employment opportunities. When Britain faced labour shortages during the Second World War, the Mirpuri seamen settled down to work in Britain, starting a process of chain migration.[1]

A second impetus to immigration came with the construction of the Mangla Dam in the Mirpur district in the 1960s. The dam submerged Mirpur's most fertile land as well as the city of Mirpur and hundreds of villages. The displaced people used their connections among the Mirpuris in Britain to find employment and emigrate.[2] The Pakistani government is also said to have "promoted" the immigration of 5,000 people.[3]

Prior to the 1990s, most British Mirpuris called themselves "Mirpuris" or "Pakistanis". Scholar Alexander Evans states that Pakistanis tended to look down upon Mirpuris as being hill-people with little culture. In the 1990s, the activists belonging to the Jammu Kashmir Liberation Front launched a Kashmir National Identity Campaign and successfully lobbied the British Parliament to get their "Kashmiri" ethnicity officially recognised. The Valley Kashmiris in the UK maintain that they are "Kashmiris" and the Mirpuris are "nouveaux Kashmiris".[4]

See also

References

  1. ↑ Ballard, Roger (2 March 1991). "Kashmir Crisis: View from Mirpur" (PDF). Economic and Political Weekly. 26 (9/10): 513–517. JSTOR 4397403.
  2. ↑ Ballard, Roger (2003), "The South Asian presence in Britain and its transnational connections" (PDF), Culture and economy in the Indian diaspora, pp. 197–222
  3. ↑ Kinship and continuity: Pakistani families in Britain. Routledge. 2000. p. 30. ISBN 978-90-5823-076-8. Retrieved 2010-04-27.
  4. ↑ Evans, Alexander (2005). "Kashmir: a tale of two valleys". Asian Affairs. 36 (1): 35–47. doi:10.1080/03068370500038989. (subscription required (help)).

External links

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