Anupam Kher to help Kashmiri Pandits set up a trust

Jammu, April 12: Bollywood actor Anupam Kher Sunday said he will stage plays to raise money for a trust that will launch welfare schemes for the displaced Kashmiri Pandits living in camps here. He said that the living conditions in the camps were `pathetic`.Kher is here in connection with the third world conference of Kashmiri Pandits. He met several representatives of the community that fled the Kashmir Valley when militancy erupted in 1990.

More than 350,000 people fled their homes and sought safety and shelter in Hindu-dominated areas within Jammu and Kashmir and elsewhere. There are still four camps outside Jammu where nearly 180,000 people live. Kher said that the community leaders have decided to set up the trust which will launch welfare schemes in the camps. `I will begin arranging funding for the trust by staging plays. I will stage play in Jammu and the money raised will be given to the trust,` he said. `Thereafter, more means would be devised to get funds for the trust.` The trust will work to improve hygiene conditions in the camps and provide separate bathrooms for women, presently using community toilets, he said. `Then on, we will look at the larger issues confronting the community,` Kher told reporters. IANS