AHMEDABAD: On Monday, Vina Kaul Kachru, 48, was seen carrying a handbag when she congregated at the Vastrapur lake along with 30 other Kashmiris to celebrate revoking of special status of J&K. She reminisces that the handbag was the only thing she could grab before fleeing her anchestral house in Anantnag for life. Her two uncles, one from paternal and another from maternal side, were shot dead by locals. Shaken with dread, the family did not even wait to pack their bags properly and fled.“I could only grabd this handbag when my mother and I fled the house. My father and my sister were separated from us in the commotion till we reunited in Jammu,” recalls Vina who was only 17 when she came to Ahmedabad. “We were waiting for this day for so long. Now that the special status has been revoked, we want the government to help us get our properties back,” she said.Most Kashmiris in Gujarat have hailed the decision of the Union government to revoke Jammu & Kashmir’s special status. They have urged the government to ensure that they can return to Kashmir and reclaim their properties.About 200 Kashmiri families reside in Gujarat, most of whom settled in the state after the exodus of Kashmiri Pandits from Jammu & Kashmir between 1989 and 1990. Around 30 of them met on Monday evening to rejoice after the government’s announcement.“We had to flee in distress and now all our properties are either grabbed, encroached or in ruins. My ancestral house is in Dersar of Kulgam district lies in a dilapidated state,” said 72-year-old A K Kaul, a retired Isro scientist, who lives in Memnagar. “A teacher’s training school has been built in on our orchard land.” He said the ancestral house of his wife, Usha, was burnt down in Natipura area of Srinagar, and all her documents were destroyed.Vijay Teng, 54, a corporate executive and a member of the Kashmir Koshur Samachar, said, “J&K will be a Union Territory and thus there will be better administration and development.” Teng hails from Srinagar and has been living in Gujarat for 30 years.Bhushan Lal Bamroo, 70, recollected the day on March 15, 1990, when he fled Kashmir with his wife and three children at 4.30am. “The situation was indeed horrifying. We were uprooted from a 20-room house and spent several months in a single room,” said the school teacher. Rajesh Miskeen, 50, who left Kashmir as a 19-year-old, said that the decision to revoke the special status will usher in development in Jammu & Kashmir.