July 5, 2020: More than 6,600 people, with most being retired soldiers and officers of Gorkha community, have been issued domicile certificates over the last one week by the administration of the Union Territory of Jammu & Kashmir, allowing them to buy the property and apply for jobs across the Union Territory.

While more than 5,900 such certificates have been issued in Jammu region, 700 such certificates have been issued to people in Kashmir division. Jammu's Bahu tehsil alone has received nearly 3,500 applications, of whom close to 2,500 people from Gorkha community have already received the certificate.

Many of the applicants also belong to the Valmiki community who were brought to J&K in 1957 from the State of Punjab after local sanitation workers had gone on a strike.

Overall, the administration has already received at least 33,000 applications and is continuing to receive an average of 200 applications a day.

It should be noted that on 26 June, Navin Kumar Choudhary had become the first senior non-local officer to get a domicile certificate. Choudhary is a senior IAS officer from Bihar and has served in J&K Government for 26 years.