The Jammu and Kashmir government on Monday broke its silence on the growing outrage against the new land laws that allowed outsiders to buy land here, claiming the reactions were “uncharitable” as 90 per cent of the land still enjoyed protection.

The Valley and many residents in Jammu are up in arms against the new land laws introduced last month which are allegedly aimed at changing the demography of the fledgling Union Territory.

There have been protests in Jammu where many Dogras claim the laws were an assault on their culture.

The government’s principal secretary and chiefspokesperson, Rohit Kansal, on Monday said the reactions were “uncharitable” as theold laws were “outdated”,“regressive” and “anti-people” and have been changedby “modern, progressiveand people-friendly provisions”.

“The new land laws will not only afford protection to over 90 per cent of the land in J&K from being alienated to outsiders but will also help revamp the agriculture sector, foster rapid industrialisation, aid economic growth and create jobs in J&K,” Kansal said at a news conference in Srinagar.

People’s Democratic Party spokesperson Suhak Bukhari said the people of Jammu and Kashmir and not “Delhi darbar” will decide what is pro or anti-people.

“What the governmentis saying is part of thepropaganda that it has unleashed after the abrogation of Article 370. The basic question is what their intent is. They have been issuing order after order to disempower and disenfranchise J&K’s permanent residents,” Bukhari told The Telegraph.

Some asked if the old laws were regressive, why they were not being removed in Ladakh, which was carved out of J&K. The Centre has promised to look into the demand of Ladakhi Buddhists to include the region into the Sixth Schedule of the Constitution, which will bar outsiders from buying land there.

Kansal went into the technicalities of the old law — like the existence of two different laws where a ceiling of 182 kanals (a measurement of land equivalent of 0.125 acres) was fixed in Big Landed Estates Abolition Act and was superseded by 100 standard kanals in the Agrarian Reforms Act, 1976.

“Both provisions continued to coexist creating contradiction and confusion,” he said.

These “old laws” are believed to be the biggest agrarian reforms in any part of South Asia and gave large swathes of land to the tillers — who have been toiling for generations.

While the government claims 90 per cent of the land would be unavailable for sale to outsiders, much of it comprises mountains, forests, water bodies — which form the bulk of J&K’s landscape. The 10 per cent land available for sale is the prime land in cities and municipalities.

There have been several protests, mostly in Jammu, against the new land laws in the last few days. Civil society members in Srinagar staged a protest on Monday against the “sale of land” to outsiders.

Many are blaming the Centre for unleashing agencies like the National Investigation Agency to pre-empt the protests.