27 Oct 1947 is the day when Indian Army entered the state of Jammu and Kashmir and illegally occupied a major part of it. Despite subsequent UN Resolutions, India continues to deny the people of Jammu and Kashmir their right to self-determination for their political future. While the people of Jammu and Kashmir continue to struggle and look towards the international community to end the illegal occupation of their land, India has embarked upon a sinister plan to change the demography and geography of the occupied state in a brazen contravention to international law. In order to suppress the protesting voices of the Kashmiris, India has unleashed a reign of terror in the occupied state where more than 800,000 Indian troops are deployed armed with lethal weapons like pellet guns and draconian laws giving the occupation forces immunity and a free hand to crash the resistance of the helpless people of Jammu and Kashmir. Throughout the world, Kashmiris observe 27 October as ‘Black Day’.
According to the latest figures by Kashmir Media Service, since the illegal occupation of Kashmir by India, more than 95,000 Kashmiri youths have been killed which includes more than 7,000 custodial killings, around 165,000 civilians arrested leaving behind around 23,000 widows or half widows, more than 11,000 women raped or molested and more than 110,000 houses have been burnt as collective punishments to the people who do not accept India’s illegal occupation. All major international human rights organizations, including UNO continue to express great concern over the situation in the Indian occupied Kashmir.
On 5 August 2019, India made highly controversial changes in its constitution which allowed Indian citizens to get Kashmiri domiciles enabling them to buy land and get government jobs in the occupied state. This is a sheer violation of the international law due to the fact that Kashmir is an internationally recognized disputed territory and India cannot make any geographic or demographic change unilaterally. In order to change the demographic balance of the state against Muslims, Indian government has issued over 3.4 million so-called domicile certificates to non-Kashmiri outsiders to become settlers in the state. This action resembles Israel’s illegal settlement policies and is characteristic of tactics used by occupiers.
After putting in action its plans to temper with Kashmir’s demography, India’s ruling ultra nationalist regime under BJP is now bent on distorting Kashmiri religious and cultural identities and imposes its Hindutva ideology on the occupied state. Mehbooba Mufti, former Chief Minister of J&K, has recently twitted about forced singing of bhajans (Hindu hymn) by Muslims students at a school in Kulgam and elsewhere which prompted fierce protests from Muslim organisations. The Muttahida Majlis-i-Ulema (MMU), comprising 30 Kashmiri organisations led by Kashmiri leader Mirwaiz Umar Farooq, who has been in detention for the past three years, has condemned “the so-called integration of the younger generation with the Hindutva idea of India”.
In September 22, several Muslim scholars were arrested and charged under the draconian public safety act in a crackdown on Muslim groups in Kashmir. MMU has termed it as part of the attempts to “browbeat” Muslim scholars and undermine their role, citing the recent arrests of religious leaders in India’s latest intensification of repression.
The BJP has also taken control of the Jammu & Kashmir Waqf Board and thus all its properties across the region including important religious places of Muslims, which they have been using for congregational prayers political activism. This move is aimed at eliminating political role as well as the religious identity of Kashmiri Muslims and forcing in Hindutva to alter the Muslim identity of Kashmir. In yet another sinister move to dilute Kashmiri culture, BJP has inserted Hindi and Dgori as official languages besides Urdu which has been exclusive official language for more than 100 years.
The Indian government also embarked upon gerrymandering the electoral constituencies to give edge to Hindus and non-Muslims and effectively depriving Muslims to form future government in their own state. On the other hand the Kashmiri leadership remains in illegal Indian incarceration under trumped up charges. One such leader is Yasin Malik, the iconic Kashmir leader has been sentenced on a fallacious case. Kashmiris fear that like many political leaders, Yasin Malik can be killed during incarceration. Most recently, Altaf Ahmed Shah, son in law of the great Kashmiri leader, late Syed Ali Shah Geelani, died during custody of the occupation forces in occupied Kashmir.
According to the September 2022 briefing by Amnesty International, “the Indian government has drastically intensified the repression of the people of J&K … by subjecting them to multiple human rights violations. These violations include restrictions on rights to freedom of opinion and expression; to liberty and security of person; to movement; to privacy; and to remedy and access to justice. The authorities have committed these violations with absolute impunity.”
Against this grim background, it is highly ironic that Indian government is trying to launch and project grand development projects in the occupied state to hoodwink the international community that all was hunky-dory in Jammu and Kashmir, which is indeed a big lie.
Through these abominable tactics, the BJP is trying to disempower Muslims and erode their religious and cultural identities in the occupied region and consolidate its illegal occupation. The shameful undertaking that India started on 27 October 1947, continues with added miseries for the helpless Kashmiris. It has been a long ordeal which must be put to an end. After the obvious ineffectiveness of UN Resolutions and other diplomatic efforts, only a strict international response will bring India to its senses. International economic and political sanctions will find their most appropriate use in case of India. Their seems to be no other peaceful means to bring long due relief to the people of Kashmir and solve this matter for the sack of justice and peace. Otherwise, if the world fails to respond, then, in the words of veteran Kashmiri leader Farooq Abdullah, former chief minister of J&K, “Kashmir could explode like a volcano”.
