NC’s Familiar Flip-Flop: Omar Abdullah’s U-Turn on Kashmir

The political landscape of Jammu and Kashmir has long been a complex tapestry woven with history, identity, and the aspirations of its people. At the heart of this evolving narrative is the National Conference (NC), a party that has historically claimed to be the voice of Kashmiris. However, it has repeatedly shifted its position — from advocating for the people’s aspirations to aligning itself with the policies of New Delhi. The recent change in stance by NC leaders, particularly Omar Abdullah, raises serious questions about the party’s commitment to its promises and the people it claims to represent.

By:Altaf Hussain Wani

In the run-up to the 2024 Lok Sabha and Assembly elections, both Omar Abdullah and his father, Farooq Abdullah, strongly advocated for the resumption of dialogue with Pakistan, considering it essential for resolving the long-standing Kashmir issue. Their stance echoed the sentiments of former Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee, who famously said, “Friends can be changed, but not neighbours.”

Scepticism over call for dialogue

This call for dialogue was always viewed with scepticism by those familiar with Abdullah’s political manoeuvring. However, some believed it reflected an understanding of Kashmir’s complex realities — where aspirations for peace and stability are deeply intertwined with the region’s turbulent history.

Yet, Omar Abdullah’s recent remarks declaring that there was “no scope” for dialogue with Pakistan due to a “spree of terror attacks” represent a dramatic reversal of his previous position. This volte-face has raised eyebrows and invited scrutiny, especially among those who have long championed peace and self-determination in Kashmir. Abdullah’s assertion that Pakistan is meddling in Jammu and Kashmir, while not entirely unfounded, conveniently overlooks the internal grievances and aspirations of the Kashmiri people.

The statistics paint a grim picture — 122 lives lost in 60 violence-related incidents in 2024 alone, including civilians and security personnel. Yet, these figures must be understood within the broader context of Kashmir’s socio-political landscape. The cycle of violence, often exacerbated by heavy militarisation and impunity, cannot be separated from the deep-seated local discontent arising from years of political alienation, economic deprivation, and human rights violations.

Shifting the Narrative

By attributing Kashmir’s unrest solely to external factors, Omar Abdullah risks ignoring the root causes of resistance and the people’s long-standing grievances against Indian rule. Furthermore, the NC’s historical commitment to the restoration of Article 370 and statehood for Jammu and Kashmir has also come under scrutiny. The abrogation of Article 370 in 2019 was a watershed moment, stripping the region of its autonomy.

While the NC initially took a strong stand against this move, its leadership now appears to be retreating, with Omar Abdullah outrightly rejecting any possibility of restoring the Article. This shift raises serious doubts about the party’s integrity and its ability to stand by its commitments. The implications of these developments are concerning. The National Conference, which was once seen as a viable alternative to the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) in Kashmir, now appears to be navigating the treacherous waters of political expediency.

The call for dialogue with Pakistan — once a defining stance — has now been replaced with a narrative focused on security and counter-terrorism, aligning the NC more closely with the Modi government’s position. This shift not only alienates a significant segment of the population that yearns for a peaceful resolution but also undermines the possibility of meaningful dialogue that could address the aspirations of the Kashmiri people.

NC's current trajectory

The NC’s current trajectory suggests a party more concerned with maintaining political relevance than advocating for Kashmiris’ rights. The rhetoric about fostering a “friendly working relationship” with Pakistan now rings hollow when placed against the backdrop of Abdullah’s refusal to engage in dialogue.

There is an increasing disconnect between the party’s leadership and the realities faced by ordinary Kashmiris, who continue to endure the consequences of decades of conflict. Moreover, the rejection of statehood and the restoration of Article 370 not only weakens the region’s political autonomy but also dismisses the historical and emotional significance these provisions held for the people.

The promise of self-governance and the recognition of Kashmir’s unique identity are essential components of any meaningful political discourse. By backtracking on these commitments, the National Conference risks alienating its core support base.

Omar Abdullah’s recent political U-turn and the NC’s shifting stance on crucial issues such as dialogue with Pakistan, statehood, and Article 370 reflect a troubling trend in Kashmiri politics. It is imperative for the people of Kashmir — and members of the NC — to hold political leaders accountable for their promises and push for genuine dialogue that prioritises the voices of Kashmiris.

The path to peace and resolution does not lie in political expediency but in recognising the aspirations, grievances, and rights of those who call this beautiful yet troubled region home.

Only by staying true to these principles can the region hope to move towards a future where dialogue, understanding, and reconciliation take precedence over conflict and division.

(The writer is chairman Kashmir Institute of International Relations and can be reached @ saleeemwani@hotmail.com and on X @sultan1913)

 

 

 The Dissonance of Indian Democracy: Human Rights Concerns in Indian occupied Jammu and Kashmir 

The recent remarks made by United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights, Volker Turk, regarding the situation in Jammu and Kashmir and Manipur have sparked a vehement response from the Indian government. Ambassador Arindam Bagchi’s dismissal of Turk’s comments as “cherry-picking” obscures a more complex reality: the ongoing human rights abuses and the suppression of dissent in Jammu and Kashmir, which contradicts the narrative of normalcy and development that India seeks to project.

 

The Reality of Human Rights Abuses

 

In Jammu and Kashmir, the Indian state has employed a range of draconian laws that have been instrumental in stifling dissent and curbing civil liberties. The Armed Forces (Special Powers) Act (AFSPA) and the Public Safety Act (PSA)  Unlawful prevention Activities Act (UAPA) are three such laws that grant security forces sweeping powers to detain individuals without trial and to use lethal force with impunity. Reports from various human rights organizations, including Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch,two OHCHR reports and numerous communications to government of India  have documented extrajudicial killings, enforced disappearances, and torture in the region. The chilling effect of these laws has created an environment where fear prevails over freedom, and dissent is met with severe repercussions.

 

The use of state machinery to intimidate human rights defenders and independent journalists has become increasingly apparent. Government agencies like the National Investigation Agency (NIA) and the State Investigation Agency (SIA) have been utilized to target those who dare to speak out against the government’s policies. Journalists have faced harassment, arbitrary detention, and even violence for reporting on human rights abuses or expressing dissenting opinions. This systematic suppression of free speech is a direct affront to the democratic principles that India claims to uphold.

 

The Illusion of Normalcy and Development

 

Ambassador Bagchi’s assertion that Jammu and Kashmir has witnessed remarkable improvements in peace and development is a narrative that requires careful scrutiny. While the Indian government points to infrastructure projects and increased tourism as indicators of progress, these developments often come at a significant cost to the local population and environment.

 

The construction of roads and railways, framed as pathways to development, frequently disrupts the livelihoods of local communities who depend on agriculture and natural resources. The environmental consequences of such projects are dire, leading to deforestation, soil erosion, and water scarcity. The focus on infrastructural development appears to prioritize economic growth over the well-being of the local population, further alienating them from their land and resources.

 

Moreover, the claim of record voter turnout in provincial elections is misleading. In a region where political dissent is met with brutal repression, participation in elections often reflects a coerced compliance rather than a genuine expression of democratic choice. Many residents view these elections as a facade, a means for the Indian government to legitimize its control over the region. The overwhelming sentiment among the populace is one of disenfranchisement and a desire for self-determination, rather than a vote of confidence in the Indian state or Prime Minister Narendra Modi.

 

The Broader Implications of State Repression

 

The broader implications of the Indian government’s approach to Jammu and Kashmir extend beyond the immediate human rights abuses. The ongoing repression serves to entrench divisions within Indian society, as it fosters an environment of mistrust and alienation among various communities. The portrayal of Kashmir as a region that has been “normalized” ignores the lived experiences of its residents, who continue to face violence, discrimination, and systemic oppression.

 

The international community must recognize that the situation in Jammu and Kashmir is not merely a domestic issue but a matter of global concern. The human rights abuses occurring in the region reflect a failure of the Indian state to uphold its commitments to democratic governance and the protection of civil liberties. The UN’s role in highlighting these issues is crucial, as it serves to hold governments accountable for their actions and to advocate for the rights of marginalized populations.

 

Conclusion

 

The dissonance between the Indian government’s portrayal of democracy and the reality on the ground in Jammu and Kashmir is stark. While officials like Ambassador Bagchi may dismiss international concerns as unfounded, the evidence of human rights abuses and systemic repression cannot be overlooked. The use of draconian laws to intimidate dissenters and the prioritization of development projects that undermine local livelihoods paint a troubling picture of a regiongrappling with the consequences of occupation.

 

As the world watches, it is imperative that the voices of those in  Indian occupied Jammu and Kashmir are heard and that their struggle for justice and self-determination is acknowledged. The path toward genuine democracy and human rights in India must begin with a commitment to addressing the grievances of all its citizens, particularly those in regions like Jammu and Kashmir, where the promise of democracy has been overshadowed by repression and violence.

 

Altaf Hussain Wani Is chairman of Kashmir Institute of International Relations (KIIR) and can be reached at  saleeemwani@hotmail.com X. @sultan1913

 

 

  

Illusion of Normalcy: Jaishankar’s Kashmir Narrative Unravelled

 

As a Kashmiri activist, I find it imperative to address the recent remarks made by External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar at Chatham House in London regarding the abrogation of Article 370 and the situation in Kashmir. While the minister lauds this unilateral decision as a step in the right direction, it is crucial to examine the reality on the ground, the historical context, and the promises made by Indian leaders to the people of Kashmir.

The abrogation of Article 370, which granted special status to Jammu and Kashmir, was not merely a legal manoeuvre; it was a political act that stripped the people of Kashmir of their autonomy and rights. The special provisions enshrined in the Indian Constitution were not just privileges but commitments made to the people of Jammu and Kashmir. The founding leaders of India, including Jawaharlal Nehru, recognised the unique circumstances surrounding Kashmir and assured its people that their aspirations would be respected. The abrogation of Article 370 is a betrayal of these promises and a violation of the trust placed in the Indian state.

Minister Jaishankar claims that Kashmir is thriving and that development is at its peak. However, this narrative stands in stark contrast to the lived experiences of the Kashmiri people. The ground realities tell a different story—one marked by a pervasive atmosphere of fear and repression. His government’s failure to honour these commitments speaks volumes about its disregard for the democratic rights of the Kashmiri people.

The situation in Jammu and Kashmir has drawn international attention, with the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights addressing Kashmir’s human rights situation in global updates and UN officials expressing concern over deteriorating conditions. Jaishankar’s remarks reflect deep-seated frustration in the face of international scrutiny.The narrative of normalcy is a façade that crumbles under the weight of the lived experiences of the Kashmiri people.

Rather than addressing these concerns, the government resorts to frustration and denial. When questioned about its actions in Kashmir, the government issues statements devoid of substance, attempting to dismiss legitimate concerns as mere propaganda. This reaction is indicative of a government that is losing its grip on the narrative and is unwilling to confront the reality of its actions. The refusal to demilitarise Kashmir raises further questions about commitment to normalcy. If the situation is indeed as stable as the External Affairs Minister claims, why does India maintain a heavy military presence in the region? The continued militarisation of the region is a clear indication that the government is aware of the fragility of the situation and is unwilling to take genuine steps towards reconciliation.

None of the draconian laws, such as the Armed Forces Special Powers Act (AFSPA) and the Public Safety Act (PSA), have been withdrawn. These laws continue to enable impunity for human rights violations and further alienate the Kashmiri people.

The abrogation of Article 370 and the subsequent claims of development and normalcy are nothing more than a smokescreen to mask the ongoing repression in Kashmir. The government must confront the reality that the aspirations of the Kashmiri people cannot be silenced through force or propaganda. The path to lasting peace and stability in the region lies in acknowledging the rights of the people of Kashmir and engaging in a sincere dialogue that respects their aspirations.

It is time to honour commitments to the people of Kashmir and work towards a peaceful resolution that respects their rights and aspirations. The international community must also play a role in holding players accountable for their actions and ensuring that the voices of the people in Jammu and Kashmir are heard and respected. The External Affairs Minister’s assertion that people participated in large numbers in elections must also be scrutinised. While electoral participation is often touted as a sign of normalcy, it is essential to understand the context in which these elections are held.

In a region under military occupation, where dissent is met with repression, the legitimacy of such electoral processes is highly questionable. The people of Kashmir view these elections as a façade, a means for the Indian state to project an image of democracy while suppressing their genuine aspirations for self-determination.

To further bolster his claims, Jaishankar pointed to the need to reclaim the “stolen part of Kashmir” occupied by Pakistan. This rhetoric not only perpetuates a narrative of hostility but also conveniently ignores the fact that the Kashmir conflict has an international dimension with a historical background etched in the events of 1947–48 that cannot be ignored.

Even in addressing the issue of the so-called “stolen part” of Jammu and Kashmir, a diplomatic and inclusive dialogue is essential—one that includes all stakeholders, particularly the people of Jammu and Kashmir, whose views must be ascertained through a fair, independent process.

Shattered Dreams: The Reality of Enforced Disappearances in India occupied Kashmir

In the picturesque yet tumultuous region of Indian-occupied Kashmir, the recent discovery of the body of Showkat Ahmad Bajad and Riyaz Ahmed Bajard has once again highlighted the grim reality of enforced disappearances and extrajudicial killings. Showkat, along with his brother Riyaz and another youth named Mukhtar Ahmad, went missing last month from Qazigund. The bodies of both Showkat and Riyaz have since been recovered, igniting protests and demands for accountability from their families and local communities. The recovery of body’s of Bajard Bothers from Vishnu Nala in Kulgam district serves as a haunting reminder of the ongoing violence and human rights abuses that have plagued Kashmir for decades.

The families of the missing youths staged protests on the National Highway at Qazigund, calling for an independent inquiry into the circumstances surrounding their disappearances. Members of the Jammu and Kashmir Legislative Assembly from various political parties, including the National Conference (NC), Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), and Peoples Conference (PC), joined the call for accountability, emphasizing that the issue of enforced disappearances is not an isolated incident but part of a broader pattern of state violence in the region. The history of enforced disappearances in Kashmir dates back to the early 1990s, coinciding with the onset of current phase of uprising against Indian occupation and for the quest of right to selfdetermination . During this period, Indian occupation forces remained engaged in arbitrarily arresting youths from their homes during siege and search operations, only to later deny their detention.

The Jammu Kashmir Coalition of Civil Society (JKCCS) and the Association of Parents of Disappeared Persons (APDP) have documented over 10,000 enforced disappearances and nearly 8,000 custodial killings attributed to torture in custody. These numbers reflect a staggering reality that has left countless families in anguish, searching for answers and justice. The case of Abdul Rashid Dar, who was arrested from his home in Kunan Poshpora in March 2023,and later found dead in Zurhama forests with visible signs of torture, exemplifies the brutal nature of state violence in Kashmir. Local police and the Border Security Force (BSF) claimed that he had escaped from custody, a narrative that has been widely disputed by his family and human rights advocates. Such incidents underscore the urgent need for accountability and justice for victims of state-sponsored violence.

The impunity enjoyed by Indian security forces is enshrined in laws such as the Armed Forces Special Powers Act (AFSPA), which grants them sweeping powers to operate without fear of prosecution. This draconian law has been criticized by human rights organizations and international bodies for undermining the right to life and perpetuating a culture of violence and abuse. The Indian government has consistently refused to repeal AFSPA, despite widespread calls for its abolition, insisting that it is essential for maintaining order in the region. This stance reflects a troubling disregard for human rights and the rule of law. The discovery of unmarked mass graves in various parts of Kashmir has further compounded the sense of despair among the local population.

Reports from human rights organizations have revealed the existence of these graves, believed to contain the remains of individuals who were forcibly disappeared. The lack of transparency and accountability surrounding these graves raises serious questions about the extent of state violence in Kashmir and the fate of those who have gone missing. The recent events surrounding the deaths of Showkat and Riyaz Ahmad Bajad are not isolated incidents but rather part of a broader narrative of suffering and injustice in Kashmir. The families of these youths, like many others, are left grappling with the loss of their loved ones while demanding answers from a system that has repeatedly failed them. The call for accountability is not merely a demand for justice for the deceased but a broader assertion of the people’s right to life, dignity, and justice.

The international community has a crucial role to play in addressing the human rights violations in Kashmir. The principles of international law, including the right to life and the prohibition of torture, must be upheld and enforced. The United Nations and other international bodies should take a stronger stance against the impunity enjoyed by security forces in Kashmir and advocate for an independent investigation into cases of enforced disappearances and extrajudicial killings. The people of Kashmir have long endured the consequences of state violence, but their will for justice and their demand for their rights cannot be extinguished by the killing of innocent individuals under mysterious circumstances.

The spirit of resistance among the Kashmiri people remains unbroken, as they continue to seek truth, justice, and accountability for the atrocities committed against them. In conclusion, the tragic fate of Showkat and Riyaz Ahmad Bajad serves as a poignant reminder of the urgent need for accountability and justice in Indian-occupied Kashmir. The ongoing cycle of violence and impunity must be addressed to ensure that such tragedies do not continue to unfold. The world must not turn a blind eye to the suffering of the Kashmiri people; their voices must be heard, and their rights must be upheld. Only then can there be a path toward healing and reconciliation in this beleaguered region.

Writer is chairman Kashmir Institute of International Relations and can be reached at : saleeemwani@hotmail.com

 

 

The erosion of Justice In Indian Occupied Jammu and Kashmir A critical examination of detentions under UAPA

  

The erosion of justice in Indian-occupied Kashmir, particularly through the application of the Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act (UAPA), represents a critical challenge to human rights, the rule of law, and democratic principles. The UAPA, with its vague definitions and broad scope, has been weaponized to suppress dissent, leading to arbitrary detentions, prolonged incarcerations, and the denial of fair trials. This article critically examines the implications of UAPA in Kashmir, focusing on its impact on justice and human rights through the lens of notable cases, including those of Khurram Parvez and Yasin Malik.

 

The UAPA and Its Implications

 

The UAPA, enacted in 1967, was designed to combat unlawful activities and terrorism. However, its ambiguous language and expansive interpretation have enabled its misuse, particularly in politically sensitive regions under Indian occupation ie Jammu and Kashmir. The law allows authorities to detain individuals based on mere suspicion, often without substantial evidence or due process. This has created a legal environment where dissent is criminalized, and civil liberties are curtailed.

 

In Kashmir, where political unrest and resistance to Indian rule are prevalent, the UAPA has been used to target activists, journalists,political leaders and businessmen. The law’s application has contributed to a climate of fear, where individuals are detained for years without trial, and the judicial process is often bypassed in the name of national security.

 

Prolonged Detentions and the Absence of Fair Trials

 

The UAPA has facilitated prolonged detentions without trial, violating fundamental human rights principles, including the right to a fair trial as enshrined in the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR). In Kashmir, this has led to the incarceration of numerous individuals, including, Shabir Ahmed Shah, Massrat Alam Butt, Nayeem Ahmed Khan, Aysia Andrabi, Nahida Nasreen Fahmida Sufi and scores of others, often without formal charges or access to legal recourse.

 

Case of Khurram Parvez

 

Khurram Parvez, a prominent human rights activist and chairperson of the Jammu and Kashmir Coalition of Civil Society (JKCCS), was arrested in November 2021 under UAPA. Accused of engaging in anti-national activities, Parvez has been detained without substantial evidence, despite widespread calls for his release. His case highlights the arbitrary nature of UAPA detentions and the lack of judicial integrity in Kashmir. Parvez’s prolonged detention not only undermines his rights but also sends a chilling message to other human rights activists and dissenters.

 

Case of Yasin Malik

 

Yasin Malik, a political leader and chairman of the Jammu and Kashmir Liberation Front (JKLF), was arrested in 2019 and charged under UAPA with conspiracy and funding terrorism. His trial has been marred by allegations of unfair treatment, lack of access to legal counsel, and an opaque judicial process. Malik’s case underscores the systemic issues within the Indian judicial system, particularly in relation to Kashmir, where political dissent is often equated with terrorism.

 

Judicial Decisions and the Erosion of Justice

 

The Indian judiciary’s handling of UAPA cases has been inconsistent and often disappointing. While the Supreme Court has occasionally emphasized the importance of due process, as seen in the case of Arup Bhuyan vs. State of Assam (2011), these rulings have had limited impact in Kashmir. The Jammu and Kashmir High Court has frequently upheld detentions under UAPA, citing national security concerns, even in the absence of concrete evidence.

 

For instance, in Khurram Parvez’s case, the High Court dismissed petitions for his release, prioritizing national security over individual rights. This raises serious concerns about the judiciary’s role as a check on executive power and its ability to uphold justice in a region marked by political strife and human rights violations.

 

International Law and Human Rights Obligations

 

India’s use of UAPA in Kashmir contravenes its obligations under international law, particularly the ICCPR, which mandates the right to a fair trial and prohibits arbitrary detention. The United Nations and various human rights organizations have repeatedly called on India to adhere to its international human rights obligations, emphasizing the need for transparency, accountability, and respect for individual rights. The arbitrary detentions in Kashmir not only undermine the rule of law but also contribute to a broader narrative of impunity. The Indian government’s disregard for international human rights standards exacerbates the climate of fear and repression in the region, further complicating the already fraught political landscape.

 

Societal Impact and the Quest for Justice

 

The prolonged detentions under UAPA have far-reaching implications for Kashmiri society. Families are torn apart, communities are silenced, and the psychological toll on detainees is profound. The lack of accountability for human rights violations perpetuates a cycle of violence and resistance, further destabilizing the region.  The denial of justice not only affects individuals but also erodes trust in the judicial system and democratic institutions. The psychological trauma experienced by detainees and their families, coupled with the pervasive climate of fear, has long-term consequences for the social fabric of Kashmir.

 

Conclusion: The Urgent Need for Reform

 

The situation in Kashmir underscores the urgent need for reform in the application of security laws like the UAPA. The arbitrary detentions and denial of fair trials represent a systemic assault on justice, human rights, and democratic principles. As the international community continues to scrutinize India’s human rights practices, the Indian government must reassess its approach to security and dissent in Kashmir.

To restore faith in the judicial system and uphold the rule of law, it is imperative to ensure that individuals are afforded their right to a fair trial and that arbitrary detentions are curtailed. The path to justice in Kashmir requires a commitment to human rights, accountability, and transparency. The lives of countless individuals, including Khurram Parvez and Yasin Malik, depend on the restoration of these fundamental rights. The international community must continue to advocate for justice in Kashmir, holding India accountable to its international obligations and supporting the quest for a just and democratic society.

 

Writer is Chairman of Islamabad based think Tank , Kashmir Institute of International Relations (KII) and can be reached at: saleeemwani@hotmail.com X : @sultan1913

  

The political dilemma of Jammu and Kashmir: A call for justice and autonomy

 

The Nationalist Congress (NC) won the recent parliamentary elections in response to the controversy of the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) , especially the abrogation of Articles 370 and 35A , which stripped the region of its special status. However, the victory raises serious questions about the future direction of the NC and the broader political aspirations of the Kashmiri people.

 

The Congress has historically stressed protecting Article 370, but this is often a double-edged sword. While this has won support from those who feel marginalized by the BJP's centralization of power, it has also exposed how the party's long-standing promises have sometimes betrayed the people it seeks to represent. For decades, slogans of restoring pre-1953 status have echoed in the Kashmir Valley, yet the reality on the ground is rife with disappointment and betrayal. People often find themselves stuck in a cycle of unfulfilled promises, leading them to grow increasingly skeptical of the parties they once trusted.

 

The recent victory of the Nationalist Congress in the general elections was not a harbinger of popularity, but rather a collective dissatisfaction with the policies of the BJP. The political atmosphere is permeated with resentment against the BJP’s agenda, which many see as an attempt to disempower the people of Jammu and Kashmir , especially the Muslim population. This resentment is not only political but also deeply personal, intertwined with the lived experiences of those who have experienced violence, oppression and the denial of their basic rights.

 

The lack of substantive progress by the Omar -led government, which has been in power for six months, is a wake-up call. The people are demanding not just symbolic representation but action that is consistent with their aspirations for self-determination, peace and human rights. Worryingly, the current chief minister appears to have little real power over the police and state machinery.

 

Recent incidents, such as the hosting of a ski fashion show and the opening of a liquor store in the area without the consent of the local government, have further exposed the lack of local authority. Such incidents not only damage the credibility of the National Congress Party, but also raise questions about whether the party is willing to compromise further to maintain the appearance of power even as it becomes increasingly out of touch with the realities facing the people.

 

In this context, many people are calling for a free referendum to resolve their demands democratically. The right to self-determination is not just a political slogan, it is a fundamental human right that has been denied for too long. Activists advocating this cause emphasize the need for international attention and intervention given the long history of injustices suffered by the local people. The ongoing human rights violations, including the suppression of dissent, arbitrary detentions and the militarization of civilian life, highlight the urgency of addressing these issues through justice and accountability.

 

The political dynamics in both regions are further complicated by the broader geopolitical context, with the historical rivalry between India and Pakistan casting a shadow over the region. The aspirations of the people cannot be fully understood without acknowledging the role of external actors and the impact of their policies. The international community must play an active role in facilitating dialogue and ensuring that the voices of the people are heard and respected.

 

Finally, the current political landscape calls for a reassessment of the role played by local parties such as the National Conference, while reaffirming commitment to the principles of democracy, human rights and self-determination. People are not just objects of political manipulation, they are agents of change and deserve a future that reflects their aspirations.

 

On the road ahead, the NC must prioritize the real needs of the people it represents, or risk repeating the mistakes of the past. The time for change has come, and the call for justice and a free referendum must be louder than ever. The challenge is clear: will the NC rise to the occasion, or continue to indulge in the illusion of power while compromising the principles it claims to uphold?

 

By Altaf Hussain Wani - Chairman, Kashmiri Institute of International Relations ( KIIR ).

 

(The views expressed in this article are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect those of World Geostrategic Insights ).

 

 

The Paradox of International Human Rights Machinery: Power, Protection, and Selective Justice 

In a world ostensibly governed by international norms and legal frameworks, the machinery designed to protect human rights and humanitarian principles often reveals a stark contradiction: robust in theory yet frequently impotent when confronted with geopolitical realities.  The international human rights and humanitarian law systems, while representing humanity’s highest aspirations for justice, frequently fail to deliver meaningful protection to those most vulnerable, particularly when violations are perpetrated by powerful states or their allies.

 

The Promise vs. Reality of International Legal Frameworks

 

The post-World War II era witnessed the emergence of an impressive architecture of international human rights and humanitarian law. The Universal Declaration of Human Rights, the Geneva Conventions, the Genocide Convention, and numerous subsequent treaties and institutions promised a new world order where human dignity would be protected regardless of nationality or circumstance.

 

Yet today, this machinery often operates with a troubling selectivity. As former UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Zeid Ra’ad Al Hussein noted, “Selectivity and double standards in applying international law cripples the system and undermines its credibility.”

 

When Justice Meets Power: The Implementation Gap

 

The implementation gap between judicial decisions and actual compliance reveals the system’s fundamental weakness. Consider the International Court of Justice’s (ICJ) 2004 advisory opinion declaring Israel’s separation barrier in the occupied Palestinian territories illegal under international law. Despite the court’s clear finding that the wall violated Palestinian rights and ordering its dismantlement, the barrier remains standing nearly two decades later, with minimal international pressure for compliance. Similarly, the ICJ’s 2022 provisional measures in the case brought by South Africa against Myanmar regarding the Rohingya genocide have seen limited implementation. While legally binding, these measures lack enforcement mechanisms when powerful states or their allies choose to ignore them.

 

Most recently, the ICJ’s January 2024 provisional measures ordering Israel to prevent genocidal acts in Gaza have highlighted this implementation gap once again. Despite evidence of continuing civilian casualties and humanitarian catastrophe, effective enforcement mechanisms remain absent.

 

Selective Prosecution: Justice for Some

 

The International Criminal Court (ICC), established to end impunity for the gravest international crimes, demonstrates the selective application of international justice. While the court has primarily focused on African situations, investigations into alleged crimes by powerful nations or their allies face significant obstacles. The ICC’s preliminary examination into alleged crimes in Afghanistan, including those potentially committed by U.S. personnel, faced fierce opposition from the United States, including sanctions against ICC officials. The investigation has made little meaningful progress despite substantial evidence of serious violations.

 

Meanwhile, the ICC’s preliminary examination into the situation in Palestine has moved at a glacial pace for years, despite documented patterns of violations. When former Prosecutor Fatou Bensouda finally determined the court had jurisdiction to investigate alleged crimes in the occupied territories, she faced intense political pressure and threats from several powerful states.

 

Self-Determination Denied: Kashmir and Palestine

 

The right to self-determination, enshrined in the UN Charter and numerous human rights instruments, remains elusive for many populations living under occupation or disputed governance.

 

In Kashmir, despite UN Security Council resolutions calling for a plebiscite to determine the region’s status, the people of Kashmir have been denied this fundamental right for over seven decades. India’s 2019 revocation of Article 370, which had granted special status to Jammu and Kashmir, further entrenched direct rule from New Delhi while implementing communication blackouts, mass detentions, and restrictions on movement and assembly. The international community’s response has been largely muted, with economic and strategic partnerships with India taking precedence over human rights concerns.

 

Similarly, Palestinians continue to live under occupation in the West Bank and under blockade in Gaza, with their right to self-determination consistently undermined by settlement expansion, resource appropriation, and restrictions on movement. Despite numerous UN resolutions affirming Palestinian rights, implementation has been thwarted by geopolitical considerations and the protection afforded to Israel by powerful allies.

 

Double Standards in Application

 

The contrast in international response to different humanitarian crises reveals troubling inconsistencies. When Russia invaded Ukraine in 2022, the international community mobilized swiftly with sanctions, arms supplies, and ICC investigations. Yet similar urgency has been absent in other conflicts involving powerful states or their allies. The Yemen crisis, which has created what the UN describes as the world’s worst humanitarian crisis, continues  largely unabated. The devastating humanitarian impact, including widespread famine and civilian casualties, has not triggered comparable international legal consequences.

 

The Way Forward: Reforming the System

 

The international human rights and humanitarian law systems require fundamental reforms to address these structural inequalities:

 

1. Strengthening enforcement mechanisms: Creating consequences for non-compliance with international court decisions, potentially through mandatory UN Security Council action or alternative enforcement pathways.

 

2. Reducing politicization: Establishing greater independence for international courts and human rights bodies from political influence, including secure funding mechanisms.

 

3. Expanding jurisdiction: Supporting universal jurisdiction principles that allow national courts to prosecute international crimes regardless of where they occurred or the nationality of perpetrators.

 

4. Civil society empowerment: Enhancing the role of civil society organizations in monitoring, reporting, and advocacy to create pressure for compliance with international norms.

 

5. Reforming the UN Security Council: Addressing the structural imbalance created by the veto power that allows permanent members to shield themselves and allies from accountability.

 

Conclusion

 

The international human rights and humanitarian law systems offer vital protections in principle but frequently fail those most in need of protection when confronted with power politics. The cases of Palestine, Kashmir, Yemen, and other situations involving powerful states demonstrate how selective application undermines the entire framework’s legitimacy.

 

As former UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan observed, “When the rule of law is replaced by the rule of force, all of us are diminished.” Until the international community addresses the fundamental power imbalances that allow some states to operate with impunity while others face swift accountability, the promise of universal human rights protection will remain unfulfilled for millions of the world’s most vulnerable people.

 

The machinery exists to protect human rights globally, but its gears are jammed by the very power dynamics it was designed to transcend. True reform requires not just institutional adjustments but a fundamental recommitment to the principle that human rights protections must apply equally to all, regardless of which powers might be implicated in their violation.

 

Author: Altaf Hussain Wani – Chairman at Kashmir Institute of International Relations (KIIR).

 

(The opinions expressed in this article are solely those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of World Geostrategic Insights).

 

 

 

Kashmir’s Human Rights Struggle Gains Unexpected Spotlight at UNHRC Amid Global Conflicts 

In a world besieged by large-scale conflicts—from Gaza to Ukraine, Syria to Sudan—the 58th Session of the United Nations Human Rights Council (HRC) underscored the fragility of international law in the face of geopolitical power plays. Yet, amidst these crises, the protracted struggle for human rights in Kashmir unexpectedly found a voice. Despite India’s efforts to downplay the issue, UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Volker Türk’s critique of New Delhi’s policies marked a pivotal moment, reigniting global attention on Kashmir’s unresolved plight. High Commissioner’s Critique and India’s Defiance in his global update; Türk highlighted India’s “repressive laws” stifling freedoms of expression and opinion, explicitly referencing Kashmir’s “dire human rights situation.”

This rare censure from the HRC’s highest office surprised observers, given India’s strategic influence and the Council’s historical reluctance to confront major powers. Türk’s remarks echoed the OHCHR’s 2018 and 2019 reports, which documented widespread abuses in Jammu and Kashmir, including arbitrary detentions and excessive use of force. India’s response was swift and combative; Its Permanent Representative to the UN dismissed Türk’s concerns as “biased” and “unsubstantiated,” mirroring its reaction to prior UN critiques. “India cannot be held accountable by selective morality,” asserted the Indian permanent representative, accusing the High Commissioner of overstepping its mandate.

 

This defiance reflects New Delhi’s long-standing stance that Kashmir is an internal matter, despite UN Security Council resolutions (e.g., Resolution 47, 1948) calling for a plebiscite to determine the region’s political future. Kashmiri Delegation’s Diplomatic Push: Data-Driven Advocacy: The Kashmiri delegation amplified its advocacy through meticulously prepared literature, including the landmark report “Kashmir: 35 Years of Turmoil – India’s Abysmal Human Rights Record.” This comprehensive dossier chronicled systemic rights violations since 1989, from enforced disappearances to mass graves, and underscored India’s use of draconian laws like the Armed Forces Special Powers Act (AFSPA) to suppress dissent. Complementing this was the delegation’s September–December 2024 Human Rights Report, which provided granular updates on recent crackdowns, including arbitrary detentions of journalists and activists, and the militarization of civilian spaces. Crucially, the delegation also disseminated two counter-narrative reports: “Development and Dignity: Success Stories from Azad Kashmir” and “Refugees of 1989:

Resilience in Azad Kashmir.” These documents dismantled Indian claims and misinformation about” Azad Kashmir by spotlighting its socio-economic progress, refugee rehabilitation programs, and the integration of Kashmiri migrants displaced by conflict. Diplomats and INGO representatives praised the reports for their rigour, with one European delegate noting they “exposed the hollowness of India’s misinformation about Azad Kashmir.” In addition, members of the delegation, through their oral statements, not only highlighted the concerns regarding human rights abuses but also reminded the council members and the international community of their promises to the people of Kashmir to determine their political status and exercise their right to self-determination. Engagements with UN Mechanisms: The literature proved instrumental in the delegation’s engagements with over a dozen UN Special Rapporteurs (SRs). During briefings, SRs were provided with evidence of India’s non-cooperation with UN requests, including its refusal to permit country visits—a pattern condemned by Human Rights Watch as “obstructionist.”

The SR on Minority Issues highlighted the demographic engineering underway in Indian-administered Kashmir, citing India’s 2019 domicile laws as violations of the Fourth Geneva Convention. Side Events: Amplifying Marginalized Voices. beyond formal sessions, the delegation organised four side events, using their reports as foundational texts: 1. “Human Rights to a Healthy Environment”: The 35 Years of Turmoil report informed discussions on India’s militarised environmental degradation, including deforestation and water resource exploitation. 2. “Mental Health in Conflicts”: Data from the 2024 report revealed that 68% of Kashmiris suffer from conflict-related anxiety, per local health surveys. 3. “Demographic Shifts and International Law”: Experts cited India’s settler-colonial policies, comparing them to annexation tactics in occupied territories. 4. “Digital Rights”: The delegation linked internet shutdowns in Kashmir to India’s “digital authoritarianism,” referencing the 2024 report’s documentation of 47 blackouts in 2023 alone.

These events drew diplomats, legal experts, and NGOs, fostering dialogue often stifled in the Security Council. The Azad Kashmir development and refugee reports, in particular, challenged narratives of regional instability, with one INGO official stating they “redefined the discourse on Kashmir’s humanitarian realities.” Protest and Symbolic Solidarity; A poignant protest outside the UN’s Geneva office featured Kashmiri flags and testimonies from conflict survivors. Delegation members distributed excerpts from their reports to bystanders and media, emphasizing Kashmir’s right to self-determination. The protest, though small, embodied what scholar Angana Chatterji calls “resistance against erasure.”

 

Conclusion: A Path Forward? The HRC session revealed a paradox: even as great-power politics paralyse the UN; grassroots advocacy can pierce the silence. Türk’s remarks, coupled with the Kashmiri delegation’s data-driven advocacy, signalled that Kashmir’s struggle cannot be wholly ignored. Yet, without enforcement mechanisms, rhetoric risks remaining just that. For Kashmiris, the session offered validation. “We’re reminding the world that international law isn’t optional,” said a delegate. The delegation’s reports, now circulating within UN corridors, have laid bare India’s contradictions—its democratic pretensions versus its authoritarian practices. As India doubles down on its Hindutva agenda, the urgency for actionable accountability—whether through ICC referrals or targeted sanctions—grows. The road ahead is fraught, but as the 58th HRC session proved, Kashmir’s voice persists, resilient and unyielding.

 

The unsustainable tyranny in IIOJK

The Modi administration has intensified its campaign to force pro-freedom activists in Indian illegally occupied Jammu and Kashmir (IIOJK) into constitutional submission, deploying sophisticated coercive techniques that blend technological surveillance with traditional intimidation. Despite these efforts, Kashmiris’ resistance persists, challenging India’s narrative of “normalcy” in the troubled region.

Since the 2019 abrogation of Article 370, India has implemented a multi-layered strategy to suppress dissent in Kashmir. Beyond the 900,000 troops deployed in the region, Indian intelligence agencies now monitor social media accounts, encrypted messaging, and even family communications of suspected Hurriyat supporters. This digital dragnet creates a chilling effect on political expression.

For decades, Kashmiri people have resisted an oppressive state apparatus that seeks to silence dissent through militarization, censorship, and systemic violence. The Indian government has intensified its coercive policies, framing them as necessary for “development” and “security.” Yet, beneath the veneer of legitimacy lies a brutal reality: a people subjected to what former UN Special Rapporteur on Counter-Terrorism Ben Emmerson termed “constitutional terrorism.” This term captures the paradox of a state using legal and administrative tools to legitimize repression while eroding the very foundations of democracy and human rights. The Kashmiris’ struggle is not merely about resistance—it is a fight for identity, self-determination, and the right to exist without fear.

This militarization is not a defensive measure but a tool of psychological warfare. As scholar Christophe Jaffrelot notes, the Indian state’s strategy in Kashmir mirrors colonial tactics: divide communities, criminalize dissent, and present itself as the sole guarantor of order. The result is a population living in perpetual fear, where even a protest can lead to a bullet or a prison cell.The Indian government’s control over the narrative is ruthless. It frames dissent as terrorism, painting even peaceful protesters as enemies of the state. In the 2024 Lok Sabha elections, and local assembly elections, Kashmiri voters defied expectations by rejecting the BJP en masse, opting instead for parties perceived as less hostile to their aspirations. This was not an endorsement of the opposition but a silent rebellion against a party that has weaponized Hindu nationalism to justify its policies.

Yet, the state’s response has been to double down. Ahead of the upcoming panchayat elections, occupation forces have intensified raids on activists’ homes, warned families of “disloyal” relatives, and even forced some to publicly denounce their political beliefs. The message is clear: compliance or imprisonment.

The human cost of India’s policies is incalculable. Families are shattered by innocent killings, enforced disappearances, arbitrary detentions, torture and siege and search operations. Children grow up in a climate of fear, their schools patrolled by soldiers. The mental health crisis in Kashmir is epidemic: a 2022 study by the Indian Journal of Psychiatry found that nearly half the population suffers from depression or PTSD.Consider the case of a young man from Kathua district who, in late February, recorded a video in a mosque denying involvement in militancy. His plea was a desperate attempt to counter false accusations by occupation forces.  He took his life, his story echoes countless others: lives crushed by the weight of state violence.

The targeting of women and youth is particularly insidious. Young men are routinely picked up in midnight raids, subjected to “encounter killings,” or held incommunicado for years. Women, often the sole breadwinners after their husbands’ detention, face systemic harassment. The state’s logic is clear: break the family to break the resistance.

Despite this oppression, the spirit of resistance endures. The Hurriyat Conference, and allied political parties though banned, remain a symbol of hope. Civil society groups, despite surveillance and threats, document rights violations. India’s policies in Kashmir are unsustainable. Militarization and repression may stifle protests temporarily, but they cannot erase a people’s desire for self-determination. The Modi government’s “development” agenda—new roads, tourism campaigns—ignores the root causes of unrest: the absence of political agency and justice for past crimes and implementation of United Nations Security Council resolutions.

The writing is on the wall. As late A.G. Noorani argues, Kashmir’s future lies in dialogue, not dominance. The Indian state must engage with genuine representatives of the Kashmiri people, not just its chosen proxies. It must repeal draconian laws, release political prisoners, and allow an independent truth commission to investigate human rights abuses.In the face of overwhelming oppression, the people of Kashmir have chosen to resist. Their struggle is not just about borders or flags; it is about the universal right to live without fear, to have one’s identity respected, and to shape one’s destiny. The Indian state’s coercive policies may silence voices today, but they cannot extinguish the fire of hope.

Until then, the world must amplify Kashmiris’ voices. The international community cannot legitimize India’s occupation through silence. Sanctions on officials responsible for abuses, targeted diplomacy, and support for civil society are essential. Only when Kashmiris are granted the right to determine their own fate—whether through independence, autonomy, or integration with Pakistan—will the cycle of violence end.

The writer is Chairman Kashmir Institute of International Relations. He can be reached as saleeemwani@ Hotmail.com  and on X @sultan1913

  

The Brutal reality of India’s Occupation. The Unsustainable Tyranny in Indian-occupied Jammu and Kashmir

 

The Modi administration has intensified its campaign to force Kashmir’s pro-freedom activists into constitutional submission, deploying sophisticated coercive techniques that blend technological surveillance with traditional intimidation. Despite these efforts, Kashmiri resistance persists, challenging India’s narrative of “normalcy” in the troubled region. Since the 2019 abrogation of Article 370, India has implemented a multi-layered strategy to suppress dissent in Kashmir. Beyond the 900,000 troops stationed in the region, authorities have deployed. Intelligence agencies now monitor social media accounts, encrypted messaging, and even family communications of suspected Hurriyat supporters.

This digital dragnet creates a chilling effect on political expression. For decades, its people have resisted an oppressive state apparatus that seeks to silence dissent through militarization, censorship, and systemic violence. The Indian government has intensified its coercive policies, framing them as necessary for “development” and “security.” Yet, beneath the veneer of legitimacy lies a brutal reality: a people subjected to what former UN Special Rapporteur on Counter-Terrorism Ben Emmerson termed “constitutional terrorism.” This term captures the paradox of a state using legal and administrative tools to legitimize repression while eroding the very foundations of democracy and human rights. The Kashmiri struggle is not merely about resistance—it is a fight for identity, self-determination, and the right to exist without fear. This militarization is not a defensive measure but a tool of psychological warfare. As scholar Christophe Jaffrelot notes, the Indian state’s strategy in Kashmir mirrors colonial tactics: divide communities, criminalize dissent, and present itself as the sole guarantor of order.

The result is a population living in perpetual fear, where even a protest can lead to a bullet or a prison cell. The Indian government’s control over the narrative is ruthless. It frames dissent as terrorism, painting even peaceful protesters as enemies of the state. In the 2024 Lok Sabha elections, and local assembly elections. Kashmiri voters defied expectations by rejecting the BJP en masse, opting instead for parties perceived as less hostile to their aspirations. This was not an endorsement of the opposition but a silent rebellion against a party that has weaponized Hindu nationalism to justify its policies. Yet, the state’s response has been to double down. Ahead of the upcoming panchayat elections, occupation forces have intensified raids on activists’ homes, warned families of “disloyal” relatives, and even forced some to publicly denounce their political beliefs. The message is clear: compliance or imprisonment. The human cost of India’s policies is incalculable. Families are shattered by, innocent killings enforced disappearances and arbitrary detentions, torture and siege and search operations.

Children grow up in a climate of fear, their schools patrolled by soldiers. The mental health crisis in Kashmir is epidemic: a 2022 study by the Indian Journal of Psychiatry found that nearly half the population suffers from depression or PTSD. Consider the case of a young man from Kathua District who, in late February, recorded a video in a mosque denying involvement in militancy. His plea was a desperate attempt to counter false accusations by occupation forces. He took his life, his story echoes countless others: lives crushed by the weight of state violence. The targeting of women and youth is particularly insidious. Young men are routinely picked up in midnight raids, subjected to “encounter killings,” or held incommunicado for years. Women, often the sole breadwinners after their husbands’ detention, face systemic harassment. The state’s logic is clear: break the family to break the resistance. Despite this oppression, the spirit of resistance endures. The Hurriyat Conference, and allied political parties though banned, remain a symbol of hope.

Civil society groups, despite surveillance and threats, document rights violations. India’s policies in Kashmir are unsustainable. Militarization and repression may stifle protests temporarily, but they cannot erase a people’s desire for self-determination. The Modi government’s “development” agenda—new roads, tourism campaigns—ignores the root causes of unrest: the absence of political agency and justice for past crimes and implementation of United Nations Security Council resolutions. The writing is on the wall. As late A.G. Noorani argues, Kashmir’s future lies in dialogue, not dominance. The Indian state must engage with genuine representatives of the Kashmiri people, not just its chosen proxies. It must repeal draconian laws, release political prisoners, and allow an independent truth commission to investigate human rights abuses.

In the face of overwhelming oppression, the people of Kashmir have chosen to resist. Their struggle is not just about borders or flags; it is about the universal right to live without fear, to have one’s identity respected, and to shape one’s destiny. The Indian state’s coercive policies may silence voices today, but they cannot extinguish the fire of hope. Until then, the world must amplify Kashmiris’ voices. The international community cannot legitimize India’s occupation through silence. Sanctions on officials responsible for abuses, targeted diplomacy, and support for civil society are essential. Only when Kashmiris are granted the right to determine their own fate—whether through independence, autonomy, or integration with Pakistan—will the cycle of violence end.

 

The writer is Chairman Kashmir Institute of International Relations. Can be reached as saleeemwani@ Hotmail.com and on X @sultan1913

 

India’s Religious Freedom Crisis: A Government in Denial 

The 2024 report by the United States Commission on International Religious Freedom (USCIRF) paints a grim picture of India’s deteriorating religious freedom landscape. It highlights systemic discrimination, state-sponsored violence, and the weaponization of laws against religious minorities, particularly Muslims, Christians, and Sikhs. The report’s findings are damning, yet they are not new. For years, international human rights bodies, including UN experts and United Nations high commissioner , have raised similar concerns. What is striking, however, is the Indian government’s consistent dismissal of these reports, often labeling them as biased, uninformed, or part of a Western agenda to undermine India’s sovereignty.

 

The USCIRF report underscores how the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP)-led government has institutionalized Hindu majoritarianism, eroding the secular fabric enshrined in India’s constitution. From hate speech by top leaders to the demolition of mosques and the enforcement of discriminatory laws like the Citizenship Amendment Act (CAA) and anti-conversion statutes, the report details a pattern of state complicity in religious persecution. The government’s response to such critiques has been defensive and dismissive. It often accuses international bodies of overstepping their mandate and interfering in India’s internal affairs. This attitude reflects a broader trend of rejecting accountability, even as evidence of human rights violations mounts.

 

The Indian government’s hostility toward international scrutiny is not limited to USCIRF. UN human rights experts and rapporteurs have faced similar pushback. For instance, when UN Special Rapporteurs raised concerns about the CAA in 2020, the government dismissed their statements as “misleading” and “unwarranted.” Similarly, reports on the use of anti-terror laws like the Unlawful Activities Prevention Act (UAPA) to target activists and journalists have been met with accusations of bias. The government’s standard response is to invoke India’s democratic credentials and accuse critics of ignoring the country’s “internal challenges” and “security concerns.”

 

The Indian government’s response to reports from the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) on the human rights situation in Indian-occupied Kashmir has been consistently dismissive and combative. When the OHCHR released its reports highlighting widespread abuses, including the use of restrictive laws to target human rights defenders, journalists, and political dissenters, Indian officials labeled them as “malicious,” “fallacious,” and “cherry-picked.” This pattern of denial continued most recently on March 3, 2025, when the High Commissioner, in his global updates, expressed deep concern over the oppressive legal framework stifling fundamental freedoms in Kashmir. Indian diplomats reacted with hostility, refuting the High Commissioner’s remarks and showing a glaring lack of respect for the highest global authority tasked with monitoring human rights. Such responses not only undermine the credibility of India’s claims to uphold democratic values but also reflect a troubling refusal to engage constructively with legitimate international scrutiny. By dismissing these concerns outright, the Indian government risks perpetuating a culture of impunity and further isolating itself on the global stage.

 

This denying posture is problematic for several reasons. it undermines India’s standing as democracy .By refusing to engage constructively with international bodies, the government risks isolating itself on the global stage. Second, it perpetuates a culture of impunity. When reports of human rights violations are dismissed as “foreign interference,” it sends a message that such abuses will not be addressed. This emboldens perpetrators and leaves victims without recourse.

 

The government’s attitude also reflects a broader trend of shrinking space for dissent, both domestically and internationally. Civil society organizations, journalists, and activists who document human rights abuses face harassment, legal action, and even violence. The USCIRF report highlights how the Foreign Contribution Regulation Act (FCRA) has been used to stifle NGOs working on religious freedom and human rights. Similarly, the government has targeted critics abroad, including Sikh activists, through surveillance, threats, and even assassination attempts, as alleged in the report.

 

The Indian government’s response to these allegations has been to deny, deflect, and discredit. For example, when the Canadian government accused Indian agents of involvement in the killing of a Sikh activist in Canada, the government dismissed the claims as “absurd” and retaliated by suspending visa services. Similarly, the U.S. Department of Justice’s investigation into an assassination plot against a Sikh activist in New York has been met with silence or deflection. This approach not only undermines India’s credibility but also raises serious questions about its commitment to the rule of law.

 

The USCIRF report’s recommendations, including designating India as a “Country of Particular Concern” (CPC) and imposing targeted sanctions, are unlikely to be welcomed by the Indian government. However, they underscore the urgency of addressing religious freedom violations. The U.S. government’s continued engagement with India on security and economic issues, while largely sidestepping human rights concerns, sends mixed signals. It suggests that strategic interests outweigh the need to hold India accountable for its human rights record.

 

Ultimately, the Indian government’s dismissive attitude toward international reports is a missed opportunity. Constructive engagement with human rights bodies could help address legitimate concerns and improve India’s global standing. Instead, the government’s denial and deflection only deepen the crisis. As the USCIRF report makes clear, the erosion of religious freedom in India is not just a domestic issue—it is a global concern that demands urgent attention. The Indian government’s refusal to acknowledge this reality is a disservice to its citizens and to the principles of democracy and human rights it claims to uphold.

 

In a world increasingly defined by accountability and transparency, India’s defensive posture is unsustainable. The government of India must recognize that addressing human rights violations is not a sign of weakness but a testament to its commitment to justice and equality. Until it does so, reports like USCIRF’s will continue to cast a shadow over India’s democratic credentials.

 

 

The Unyielding Spirit of Hurriyat: Why Kashmir’s Resistance Defies India’s Narrative of Normalcy

For decades, the Indian state has framed its policy in Indian occupied Jammu and Kashmir as a battle against “terrorism,” a euphemism for suppressing the region’s longstanding demand for self-determination. Since 2019, when New Delhi unilaterally revoked Kashmir’s semi-autonomous status under Article 370, the rhetoric has intensified. Home Minister Amit Shah routinely declares that the “era of stone-pelting is over” and that “normalcy” has returned to the region. Yet, these claims crumble under scrutiny. The reality is that India’s strategy—a mix of military repression, constitutional overreach, and the criminalization of dissent—has not extinguished the political consciousness of Kashmiris. The Hurriyat Conference (APHC), despite the incarceration of its leaders and the state’s relentless coercion, remains a symbol of resistance. Its ethos persists not because of institutional power, but because it is woven into the collective memory of a people whose aspirations for dignity and agency remain unaddressed.

 

The Crushing of Dissent: Hurriyat Leaders and the Illusion of “Peace”

 

Today, the APHC—a coalition of groups advocating for Kashmiri self-determination—exists in a state of enforced silence. Its frontline leaders, such as  Yasin Malik (sentenced to life imprisonment in 2022), Shabbir Shah, Massrat Alam Butt, Nayeem Ahmed Khan, Asiya Andrabi and others, languish in jails under charges widely criticized as politically motivated. The deaths of Syed Ali Shah Geelani (2021) and Muhammad Ashraf Sehrai (2022), and Moulana Abass Ansari (2024) the three iconic resistance figures, and the continued house arrest of Mirwaiz Umar Farooq since 2019, reflect a systematic effort to decapitate the movement. Meanwhile, New Delhi promotes a narrative of “participation” by showcasing proxy politicians and low-tier electoral engagements as proof of(UAPA)that permit incarceration without trial. The state’s “constitutional terrorism”—a term used by Kashmiri activists to describe the legal erasure of their political identity—has not converted Kashmiris into willing Indian citizens. Instead, it has deepened alienation.

 

History’s Lesson: Submission Breeds Irrelevance

 

India’s playbook in Kashmir is not new. It mirrors past attempts to co-opt leaders into endorsing New Delhi’s authority, only to see their legitimacy evaporate. The most telling example is Sheikh Mohammad Abdullah, the “Lion of Kashmir,” who led the region’s accession to India in 1947 but later demanded self-determination. After years of imprisonment, he struck a deal in 1975, becoming Chief Minister under India’s terms. While he retained power, his influence waned; Kashmiris viewed him as a compromised figure. Similarly, the late Mufti Mohammad Sayeed, founder of the PDP, gained temporary popularity by positioning himself as a “soft separatist” but lost credibility after allying with the BJP in 2015.

These examples underscore a pattern: leaders who abandon the core demand for self-determination—whether coerced or enticed—are seen as collaborators. Their authority, derived from India’s machinery of power, lacks the moral legitimacy that resistance confers.

 

The Resilience of Resistance: From Stones to Silence

India’s claim that Kashmiris have “moved on” is belied by their own historical amnesia. The 1987 election rigging, which denied the Muslim United Front (MUF) its rightful victory, transformed peaceful political activism into an armed struggle. Similarly, the 2008 uprising over land transfers to Hindu pilgrims, the 2010 protests against fake encounters, and the 2016 mass mobilization after Burhan Wani’s killing reveal a recurring truth: repression fuels resistance.

 

Even today, Kashmiris navigate dissent in subtler forms. The boycott of India’s parliamentary and assembly elections—evidenced by record-low turnouts in 2019 (under 10% in Srinagar) and a muted response to the 2023 local polls—is a political statement.  And a relatively high turnout out in 2024 parliamentary and assembly elections that saw BJP  failing to gain its desired outcome.Voting is not seen as participation but as capitulation; staying away becomes an act of defiance. As Kashmiri academic Sheikh Showkat Hussain noted, “The ballot box here is viewed as a tool of occupation.” But at the same time they use it as tool against oppressor.

 

Hurriyat’s Legacy: Resistance as Identity

 

The APHC’s significance lies not in its organizational strength but in its embodiment of a collective refusal to surrender. Syed Ali Shah Geelani, even under house arrest until his death, remained a moral compass precisely because he rejected compromise. His funeral—swiftly seized by authorities to prevent mass gatherings—became a metaphor for India’s fear of his enduring influence. Similarly, the Mirwaiz, a spiritual leader and APHC moderate, retains relevance despite being silenced, illustrating that Kashmiri resistance transcends factionalism.

 

This resilience is rooted in generational trauma. The mass graves, enforced disappearances, and everyday humiliations under militarization are not forgotten. As writer Arundhati Roy observed, “There is a people here, and they do not forget.” The APHC’s ideology, flawed and fragmented as it may be, channels this memory.

 

India’s Dead End: The Futility of Repression

 

New Delhi’s current strategy—military dominance coupled with developmentalist propaganda—mirrors failed counterinsurgency models worldwide. Israel’s occupation of Palestine and Russia’s grip on Chechnya demonstrate that physical control cannot erase national identity. In Kashmir, the state’s narrative of “normalcy” clashes with lived realities: internet shutdowns, a censored press, and a youth population radicalized not by ideology but by lived injustice.

 

The 2019 constitutional changes, far from securing Kashmir’s integration, have intensified demands for accountability. International scrutiny, though inconsistent, persists; the UN Human Rights Commissioner and other International organizations continue to highlight abuses.

 

The Hurriyat Conference’s future is precarious, yet its ethos endures. India’s repression has dismantled its structure but not its symbolism. The movement survives in the quiet defiance of students, artists, and ordinary Kashmiris who refuse to legitimize occupation. It thrives in the global Kashmiri diaspora’s advocacy and in the younger generation’s reimagining of resistance through art and digital activism.

 

History offers a warning to New Delhi: no military or legal maneuver has ever extinguished a people’s quest for self-determination. From Ireland to East Timor, freedom movements have outlasted empires. In Kashmir, the Hurriyat’s flame flickers not because of its leaders but because the people keep it alive. Until India addresses the root cause—the denial of Kashmiri agency—its claims of “normalcy” will ring hollow. The silence in Kashmir today is not surrender; it is the calm before another storm.

 

As long as graves dot the villages of Kupwara and memories of crackdowns haunt the alleys of Srinagar, the sentiment of Hurriyat will endure. Resistance, in Kashmir, is not a choice—it is inheritance

 

Writer is chairman of Islamabad Based Think tank Kashmir Institute of International Relations ( KIIR)

 

 

The Perils of Impunity in Indian-occupied Kashmir: A Decades-Long Struggle for Truth and Justice 

In a poignant address to the United Nations General Assembly, the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Volker Türk underscored the enduring agony of families awaiting answers about missing loved ones in conflict zones. To make people disappear has become an ‘efficient’ tool of war and repression. This practice of making people disappear is now known as enforced disappearance, which has now been recognized as a ‘crime against humanity’. Both genocide and crimes against humanity are often associated with the use of mass graves or nameless graves to conceal the crime and also prevent individual identification.  Over the past twenty years, forensic experts have been contracted or subcontracted to investigate such mass graves by truth commissions, local courts and international tribunals, and local and international human rights and family associations in more than forty countries across the globe.

 

This anguish resonates deeply in Indian-occupied Kashmir, where enforced disappearances over the past 34 years have left thousands of families trapped in a limbo of grief and uncertainty. Amid global calls to address this crisis, Kashmir’s struggle against impunity reveals a harrowing tapestry of systemic violence, enforced disappearances, unmarked graves, torture, extrajudicial killings and relentless repression of dissent.

 

Mass graves are present in Jammu and Kashmir too. The war of suppression unleashed in 1990 by the Indian occupation forces has produced an immense humanitarian crisis in Kashmir. A high unnatural death toll of more than 970,000 persons, primarily in the age group of 18-35, detention and torture of countless persons, massacres, custodial killings, fake encounters, rape and molestations are some of the shocking results of this violent campaign of state terrorism carried by these occupation forces.

 

Reports like “Buried Evidence”: “Facts Underground” and Dead but not Forgotten” documented by the Jammu Kashmir coalition of civil society, the Association of Parents of Disappeared Persons and the International Tribunal for Peace and Justice, present a stark reality of enforced disappearance and unmarked mass graves in Indian occupied Kashmir.

 

Since the eruption of the current phase of the freedom struggle in 1989, according to the Association of Parents of Disappeared Persons (APDP)8,000 – 10,000 Kashmiris have been subjected to enforced disappearances,

 

These cases, meticulously documented by the UN Working Group on Enforced Disappearances (UNWGEID), often involve occupation forces detaining individuals who are never seen again. The Jammu and Kashmir Coalition of Civil Societies (JKCCS) estimates that over 7,000 unmarked mass graves across the region, were discovered in the region. A 2011 report by the now-disbanded State Human Rights Commission (SHRC) confirmed 2,730 unidentified graves and recommended forensic investigations, but authorities ignored these calls, burying hopes for accountability.

Faces of Tragedy: From Pathribal to Half-Widows

The 2000 Patrial fake encounter epitomises the culture of impunity. Five civilians were branded as “foreign militants” by the Indian Army, only for investigations to later expose their innocence. No convictions followed. Similarly, in 2018, Abdul Rehman Padder, a carpenter, vanished after being detained by security forces. His family’s search mirrors the plight of, the latter his body was found in a grave where he was buried as a foreign militant. Kashmir’s 3,500 half-widows—women whose husbands disappeared, leaving them in legal and social purgatory. Many mothers, like those in APDP’s protests, have died awaiting answers, their grief compounded by stigma and economic hardship.

 

Organizations like APDP and JKCCS, led by figures such as advocate Parveez Imroz, Parveena Ahanghar (the “Iron Lady of Kashmir”), and detained human rights defender Khurram Parvez, have spearheaded the fight for justice. Their efforts face brutal backlash: Khurram Parvez remains jailed under anti-terror laws, while the Jammu Kashmir Coalition of Civil Society and Association of Parents of Disappeared Persons have been subject to silence after their officer were raided and sealed in 2020.  while journalists and HRDs risk harassment, raids, and charges under the Unlawful Activities Prevention Act (UAPA). The Armed Forces Special Powers Act (AFSPA) further shields perpetrators, legitimising extrajudicial violence.

International Scrutiny and Hollow Promises

 

In 2009, the EU Subcommittee on Human Rights urged India to conduct forensic examinations of mass graves—a plea met with silence. The UNWGEID has repeatedly pressed India to ratify the International Convention on Enforced Disappearances, a step the government avoids to evade accountability. Despite the High Commissioner’s emphasis on multilateral action, India dismisses international criticism as “interference,” even as families endure endless waits.

 

The High Commissioner’s appeal—to end impunity, prioritize victims, and uphold multilateral justice—echoes the demands of Kashmiri families. Forensic investigations, prosecutions, and reparations are not merely legal obligations but moral imperatives. As the global community rallies around mechanisms like Syria’s Missing Persons Institution, Kashmir’s victims deserve no less.

 

The world must heed the cries of Kashmir’s mothers, half-widows, and activists. To ignore them is to betray our shared humanity. The pain of the disappeared may deepen, but so too must our resolve to seek truth—for without justice, peace remains a distant mirage.

 

The writer is the Chairman Kashmir Institute of International Relations (KIIR)

 

 

Weaponizing Security: The Human Rights Crisis in Indian occupied Kashmir Under AFSPA and UAPA

The Indian government’s relentless militarization of Kashmir is not a story of counter-terrorism, but of state-sanctioned repression. For decades, New Delhi has weaponized security laws like the Armed Forces (Special Powers) Act (AFSPA) and the Unlawful Activities Prevention Act (UAPA) to crush dissent, silence civil society, and deny Kashmiris their fundamental rights. These laws, framed as tools to combat insurgency, have instead institutionalized impunity, normalized violence, and turned Kashmir into a laboratory for testing authoritarian governance. The international community’s silence in the face of this crisis is not just a failure of diplomacy—it is complicity in the erasure of Kashmiri humanity. AFSPA: A License to Kill, Disappear, and Terrorize Enacted in 1990, AFSPA grants Indian security forces sweeping immunity to use lethal force, conduct arbitrary arrests, and detain individuals indefinitely in Kashmir, designated as a “disturbed area.” This law has created a culture of state terror.

Civil society groups estimate over 10,000 enforced disappearances and thousands of extrajudicial killings since its implementation. Families of victims are trapped in a Kafkaesque nightmare: to prosecute security personnel, they must first secure government approval—a near-impossible hurdle, as the state prioritizes protecting its agents over delivering justice. The Act’s brutality extends beyond individual atrocities. Entire communities, like the nomadic Gujjar Bakarwals, face collective punishment—forced displacement, restrictions on movement, and the destruction of livelihoods—under the guise of “counter-insurgency.” The UN has repeatedly condemned AFSPA for violating international humanitarian law, yet India dismisses these critiques, weaponizing the rhetoric of “national security” to deflect accountability. When then-UN Special Rapporteur (SR) Christof Heyns warned in 2012 that AFSPA perpetuates a “climate of fear,” New Delhi responded not with reform, but with deeper militarization. AFSPA is not a relic of the past. It is a living instrument of oppression, enabling the Indian state to treat Kashmiris as perpetual suspects in their own homeland. UAPA:

Criminalizing Dissent, Erasing Civic Space If AFSPA empowers physical violence, the Unlawful Activities Prevention Act (UAPA) facilitates legalized repression. Amended repeatedly to broaden its scope, the UAPA’s vague definitions of “terrorism” and “unlawful activities” allow authorities to criminalize journalism, activism, and even social media posts. Since 2019, when India unilaterally revoked Kashmir’s autonomy, hundreds of Kashmiris—including journalists, students, and human rights defenders—have been detained under this law, often without trial for years. The UAPA’s design is deliberate: to isolate and stigmatize. As UN Special Rapporteur in many joint communication from 2019 time and again stated anti-terror laws like the UAPA are wielded to “delegitimize and intimidate” dissenters. In Kashmir, this has meant raids on press clubs, bans on peaceful assemblies, and the labeling of NGOs as “terrorist fronts.” Families seeking justice for disappeared relatives face harassment, while lawyers defending UAPA detainees risk being branded “anti-national.” The law’s overreach violates the most basic principles of legal precision and proportionality, reducing due process to a fiction.The message is clear: in India occupied Kashmir, demanding accountability is itself an act of terrorism.

The Myth of “Social Terrorism” and the War on Self-Determination India’s repression is rooted in a perverse narrative that conflates Kashmiri self-determination with terrorism. Peaceful calls for autonomy are dismissed as “separatist threats,” while political parties advocating dialogue are banned. The 2019 siege of Kashmir—marked by mass arrests, internet blackouts, and a military lockdown—exposed this strategy in its rawest form. Over 8 million Kashmiris were cut off from the world as New Delhi unilaterally erased the region’s constitutional status, a move condemned by UN experts as “collective punishment.” This repression mirrors global trends where states exploit counter-terrorism frameworks to quash dissent. As SR Ben Saul emphasized in 2023, governments increasingly label grassroots movements as “violent extremism” to justify draconian measures. In Kashmir, this rhetoric has legitimized the surveillance, torture, and killing of civilians, all while India positions itself as a “victim” of cross-border terrorism. Structural Complicity:

The Failure of Global Accountability The crisis in Kashmir is not just India’s failure—it is a failure of the international system. Despite decades of documentation by UN bodies, including the Working Group on Enforced Disappearances, India has ignored calls to repeal AFSPA, reform the UAPA, or permit unfettered access to investigators. The UN’s counter-terrorism architecture, as noted in the Global Center on Cooperative Security’s Blue Sky reports, remains woefully inadequate to address such systemic abuse. Regional organizations, tasked with mediating human rights violations, have also faltered. Bodies like the South Asian Association for Regional Cooperation (SAARC) remain paralyzed by geopolitics, while India’s allies shield it from scrutiny. This impunity emboldens New Delhi: when the European Parliament proposed a resolution condemning Kashmir’s lockdown, India dismissed it as “meddling,” revealing the hollowness of global human rights commitments.

A Path Forward: Justice, Not Oppression Ending Kashmir’s nightmare requires more than symbolic gestures. The international community must: 1. Demand the immediate repeal of AFSPA and overhaul of the UAPA to align with international law. 2. Impose targeted sanctions on officials implicated in atrocities, freezing assets and banning travel. 3. Support independent investigations into enforced disappearances and extrajudicial killings, leveraging the Universal Periodic Review to hold India accountable. 4. Fund and protect Kashmiri civil society, ensuring activists and journalists can operate without fear of reprisal. The 20th anniversary of the UN Special Rapporteur’s mandate on counter-terrorism and human rights must mark a turning point. As scholar Franziska Praxl-Tabuchi argues, incremental reforms are futile; only systemic change can dismantle structures of oppression. Kashmiris do not need empty solidarity—they need the world to match their courage with action. The choice is stark: will the international community uphold the values it professes, or remain complicit in Kashmir’s suffocation? The answer will define the future of human rights in an increasingly authoritarian world.

 

Facade of Compliance: Coercion, Affidavits, and the Unraveling Myth of India Occupied Jammu Kashmir’s ‘Integration’ 

Indian Home Minister Amit Shah’s assertion that “separatism (sentiment for freedom from Indian occupation ) has become history in Jammu & Kashmir” is not just an oversimplification—it is a calculated erasure of the region’s grim realities. As a researcher engaged with India occupied Jammu Kashmir’s political trajectory for over three decades, I contend that such claims are part of a coercive statecraft aimed at manufacturing consent while obscuring New Delhi’s systemic failures to address the roots of the conflict. The resignation of Hurriyat leaders, far from signaling ideological surrender, exposes a campaign of intimidation. Meanwhile, Mr. Shah’s combative rhetoric during his ongoing visit underscores India’s refusal to confront its role in perpetuating alienation in the disputed territory.

 

Coercion and the Myth of “Voluntary” Compliance

 

The Indian government’s narrative of “normalcy” in India occupied Jammu Kashmir hinges on staged spectacles. Recent reports of separatist leaders resigning from the Hurriyat Conference—a coalition advocating self-determination—are touted as triumphs. Ground realities, however, reveal a darker truth. Former Hurriyat members, activists, and civilians are coerced into signing affidavits renouncing separatist ideologies. These documents, drafted by authorities and extracted under duress, are paraded as “voluntary declarations” to legitimize the state’s claim that Kashmiris have “moved on.”

 

Such tactics echo strategies deployed post-2019, when detainees were forced to disavow dissent after Article 370’s abrogation. Today, coercion is institutionalized: individuals are summoned to police stations, threatened with imprisonment, property seizures, or familial harassment unless they comply. The affidavits then serve as propaganda, marketed domestically and internationally as “proof” of integration. This is structural violence, not reconciliation.

Amit Shah’s Visit: Securitization Over Dialogue

Mr. Shah’s visit epitomizes New Delhi’s playbook. His speeches, laden with warnings against “anti-national elements,” prioritize securitization over dialogue. In Srinagar, he vowed to “wipe out terrorism” while ignoring demands for political engagement. His rhetoric—triumphalist and menacing—reflects India’s enduring strategy: conflating dissent with terrorism, dismissing Kashmiri aspirations as “foreign conspiracies,” and reducing a political struggle to a law-and-order issue.

 

Crucially, his visit coincides with measures tightening control over Kashmiri Muslims. Beyond rhetoric, India is expanding security grids—deploying paramilitary forces, installing AI surveillance, and multiplying checkpoints—that normalize militarization and erode communal autonomy. Simultaneously, the state prioritizes the Hindu-majority Amarnath Yatra, fortifying pilgrimage routes with biometric systems and round-the-clock security, while Kashmiri Muslims endure arbitrary stops and movement restrictions. This duality is stark: the state invests in safeguarding non-local pilgrims while weaponizing “security” to marginalize Kashmiris in their homeland. The message is clear: India occupied Jammu Kashmir’s identity and rights are subordinate to New Delhi’s majoritarian projects.

 

The Futility of Repression: Resistance Reimagined 

India’s repression has yielded diminishing returns. While overt separatist mobilization has declined, resistance persists in subtler forms. Youth alienation, fueled by unemployment and surveillance, has shifted dissent to digital realms—social media campaigns, podcasts, and online journals bypass censorship to globalize the cause. Even sporadic militancy in South Kashmir reflects despair over closed political avenues.

 

The state’s response? Further criminalization. Journalists face charges under the draconian Unlawful Activities Prevention Act (UAPA) for reporting protests. Civil society advocates are branded “anti-India” for defending human rights. Schools and universities, once hubs of discourse, are militarized. Yet, such measures only deepen resentment. As one Kashmiri youth remarked anonymously: “They can force us to sign papers, but how do they erase what we feel?”

 

International Scrutiny and the Illusion of Normalcy 

Mr. Shah’s narrative ignores India occupied Jammu Kashmir’s unresolved international status. The region remains a nuclear flashpoint, its disposition pending under UN resolutions. India’s 2019 constitutional overhaul, executed without Kashmiri consent, drew global condemnation. The European Parliament, U.S. Congress, and rights groups have repeatedly highlighted arbitrary detentions and media blackouts. Even allies like the UAE have subtly signaled unease over India’s majoritarian turn.

 

New Delhi counters with a rebranding campaign, promoting India occupied Jammu Kashmir as a “paradise” for tourists and investors. Yet, glossy brochures cannot camouflage military checkpoints flanking ski slopes or the Armed Forces Special Powers Act (AFSPA), which grants soldiers impunity. The world sees through the facade but treads cautiously, prioritizing economic ties over principle.

 

Conclusion: The Illusion Unravels

 

Amit Shah’s triumphalism is performative, designed to bolster the BJP’s nationalist credentials. But in India occupied Jammu Kashmir, the silence he celebrates is not peace—it is the exhaustion of a people battered by violence, surveillance, and broken promises. Coerced affidavits, threats, and erasure of agency are temporary fixes to a festering wound.

 

History shows that unresolved conflicts cannot be suppressed indefinitely. From Ireland to Palestine, repression fuels resistance. Until India acknowledges Kashmiris’ right to self-determination, ends impunity for rights abuses, and replaces militarization with dialogue, its claims of “integration” will remain a dangerous illusion. The spirit of freedom in India occupied Jammu Kashmir cannot be affidavit-ed away. It endures, simmering beneath the surface, waiting.

 

 

Kashmir’s Silent Agony of Disappearances

A chilling pattern of disappearances, alleged custodial deaths and violence has once again gripped Jammu and Kashmir—this time casting a dark shadow over the region’s marginalised Gujjar tribal community. A recent investigative report by Al Jazeera, combined with harrowing testimonies from families and activists, has reignited long-standing accusations of systemic impunity and human rights abuses. The government’s claims of "normalcy" stand in stark contrast to the grief and anger of communities grappling with unexplained deaths and a legacy of fear.

The deaths of two brothers, Riyaz and Showkat Ahmad from Kulgam district, epitomise the terror haunting Kashmir’s villages. The siblings went missing in February 2025 and were later found dead in a canal. Authorities attributed their deaths to drowning or suicide, but their families and local residents rejected these claims.Visible signs of physical trauma on their bodies, along with the disappearance of another youth, Mukhtar Ahmad Awan—who remains missing—have fuelled suspicions of foul play. The Gujjar community, a historically marginalised pastoral group, has borne the brunt of Kashmir’s decades-long conflict. Their remote settlements and limited political influence make them especially vulnerable.

Al Jazeera’s investigation highlights how the state’s narrative of "law and order" collapses under the weight of community testimonies. "How can two brothers drown together? Their bodies bore marks of violence. We know the truth, but who will listen to us?" asked a relative of the Ahmad brothers, echoing a sentiment of despair across the valley.In a tragic escalation of this despair, on 6 February, 25-year-old Makhan Din from Perody Kathua took his own life following brutal torture by police and paramilitary forces. In a heartbreaking video recorded prior to his death, Din detailed the inhumane treatment he endured and the coercion he faced to confess to false charges. His suicide, widely shared on social media, exposed the intimidation tactics used against communities suspected of harbouring sympathies for militants.

Following the video’s circulation, security forces launched a crackdown, detaining journalists and activists who had amplified Din’s allegations. Simultaneously, reports surfaced of non-local labourers—migrants from impoverished regions of India—disappearing under mysterious circumstances. While officials blamed militants, activists allege the disappearances reflect a broader pattern of enforced silence. "These non-locals are pawns in a larger game. Their disappearances are meant to signal that no one is safe," observed a Srinagar-based human rights lawyer.

Distrust deepened further in December 2023 when three civilians—Shabir Ahmed, Safeer Ahmed, and Mohammad Showkat—were allegedly tortured to death by soldiers in Poonch. The men were among 13 civilians detained after a militant attack on an Army convoy that killed four soldiers. Their battered bodies returned to families days later, exposed a brutal reality: extrajudicial punishment carried out under the guise of counterinsurgency.

The incident triggered outrage even in areas like Rajouri-Poonch, which was historically seen as less sympathetic to militancy. Mehbooba Mufti, former Chief Minister of Jammu and Kashmir, lambasted the government’s claims of peace, asking: "Is this Naya (New) Kashmir?" She alleged that 12 others from Topa Pir village were hospitalised with torture injuries, highlighting the widespread nature of the abuse. In a paradoxical twist, Wali Mohammad, father of the deceased Shabir Ahmed, now plans to send his grandson to an Army school. "The wounds will never heal, but we want the next generation to have opportunities we never did," he said—a bittersweet reflection of both the desperation for normalcy and the entrenched power dynamics that leave families with little choice.

The 2020 Amshipora "encounter" in Shopian district laid bare the deadly consequences of militarisation. Three Kashmiri labourers—including a minor—were lured to an orchard, killed by Army personnel, and branded as "foreign terrorists" to claim a ₹20 lakh cash reward. Investigations later confirmed the victims were innocent daily-wage workers.  This was not an isolated case. In 2000, the Pathribal fake encounter saw five civilians executed by the Army, falsely accused of massacring 35 Sikhs. Despite the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) indicting five officers, the Army invoked the Armed Forces Special Powers Act (AFSPA) to block prosecutions, citing immunity. Similarly, the 2010 Machil encounter involved three labourers from Baramulla killed near the Line of Control (LoC) under fabricated charges of infiltration.

Though a court-martial convicted five personnel, their sentences were widely criticised as tokenistic. "Machil was a rare admission of guilt, but the light punishments showed the system protects its own," said Parvez Imroz, a prominent human rights defender. These cases, spanning decades, reveal a culture where financial incentives and promotions drive extrajudicial killings. The AFSPA shields perpetrators, perpetuating a cycle of violence with little hope of justice. Kashmir’s conflict as per unofficial estimates relying on media reports has claimed over 96,000 lives since 1989, with more than 8,000 enforced disappearances documented by human rights groups. The Gujjar community, often trapped between militants and counterinsurgency forces, faces dual marginalisation: distrusted by the state and vulnerable to exploitation by armed groups.

In this scenario, the Indian army’s recent attempts at "image makeovers"—organising youth events, reopening schools, and promoting development projects—ring hollow for many. Following the Poonch deaths, Lt. General Upendra Dwivedi vowed "zero tolerance" for human rights violations, but survivors remain sceptical. "We’ve heard these promises before. Nothing changes," said a survivor of the 1990s Kunan Poshpora mass rape case, which remains buried in legal limbo.

From Pathribal to Poonch, Kashmir’s history is scarred by state violence and institutionalised impunity. The plight of the Gujjar community, Makhan Din’s suicide, and the targeting of non-locals expose a crisis where truth is the first casualty. International bodies, including the United Nations, have repeatedly called for independent investigations, but India continues to dismiss these as unwarranted interference. Until systemic changes are made, Kashmir’s silent agony will endure—marked by graves without names, cries without answers, and a future without justice.

 

 

Mirage of Peace in Kashmir

The Indian government, under Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Home Minister Amit Shah, has persistently propagated a narrative of “normalcy” and “integration” in Jammu and Kashmir since the revocation of its special status in August 2019.

 

Officials claim that Kashmiris are “leaving the path of violence” and embracing India’s constitutional framework with “pride.” However, the ground reality, as evidenced by recent events, paints a starkly different picture—one of intensified militarization, systemic repression, and the ruthless silencing of dissent. The chasm between New Delhi’s rhetoric and the lived experiences of Kashmiris exposes a troubling contradiction that demands urgent global attention.

 

Militarization Masquerading as Security

 

The killing of Junior Commissioned Officer (JCO) Kuldeep Chand in an attack in the Akhnoor sector and the subsequent military crackdowns exemplify the volatile environment in the region. Following the incident, Indian forces launched extensive cordon-and-search operations, deploying reinforcements and restricting civilian movement. Such operations, framed as “retaliatory measures,” have become routine, transforming entire neighborhoods into open-air prisons. The Srinagar-Jammu Highway, a critical lifeline for Kashmiris, now resembles a militarized zone, with checkpoints, sniffer dogs, and surveillance tools scrutinizing every vehicle and individual.

 

While Indian authorities justify these measures as necessary for “security,” locals perceive them as tools of collective punishment designed to instill fear. The heavy troop presence and invasive surveillance contradict claims of stability. If Kashmiris were truly “integrating” willingly, why does the state rely on such oppressive tactics? The answer lies in New Delhi’s refusal to acknowledge the political roots of the conflict, opting instead to suppress dissent through brute force.

 

Human Rights Violations

 

The recent killing  of three Kashmiri youth in Kishtwar district during a prolonged military operation underscores the human cost of India’s counterinsurgency strategy. What began as a search operation in Chattru forest culminated in extrajudicial killings, a pattern consistent with decades of state violence. Indian forces routinely label victims as “terrorists” to legitimize their actions, but eyewitness accounts and local narratives often reveal a darker truth—the targeting of civilians and activists opposed to occupation.

 

These operations are not isolated incidents. Data from rights groups highlight a surge in civilian casualties, arbitrary detentions, and torture since 1989. The Armed Forces Special Powers Act (AFSPA), which grants troops legal immunity, has further emboldened human rights abuses, among the international community’s silence.

 

Silencing Dissent: The War on Political Expression

 

Parallel to military operations, India has waged a systematic campaign to dismantle Kashmiri political resistance. The Hurriyat Conference, a coalition of pro-freedom groups, has borne the brunt of this crackdown. Its leaders face house arrests, arbitrary detentions, and coerced “affidavit submissions” renouncing their political stances. Such tactics, reminiscent of colonial-era subjugation, aim to erase dissent from public memory and create an illusion of consent.

 

The criminalization of protest extends beyond political outfits. Students, journalists, and civil society actors risk harassment, imprisonment, or worse for criticizing state policies. The arrest of human rights defender Kharrum parvez, journalist Irfan Mehraj , Sajjad Gul, Asif Sultan  for “anti-national” reporting, detention of Ashan Untoo, exemplifies this trend. By conflating dissent with terrorism, India seeks to delegitimize the Kashmiri struggle for self-determination—a right enshrined in UN resolutions.

 

Development or Propaganda? The Facade of Progress

 

Amid this repression, the Indian government has aggressively marketed infrastructure projects like the Udhampur-Srinagar-Baramulla Rail Link (USBRL) as symbols of “development.” Modi’s planned inauguration of the project in Reasi has been accompanied by draconian security measures, including. Such projects, while economically significant, cannot mask the grim realities of occupation. Infrastructure built under the shadow of militarization serves as a propaganda tool, designed to project normalcy to the outside world while ignoring the alienation of Kashmiris.

 

Moreover, these initiatives often prioritize strategic military interests over local welfare.Highways and tunnels facilitate faster troop mobilization, further entrenching India’s control. For Kashmiris, “development” without political rights rings hollow—a sentiment echoed in protests against land grabs and resource exploitation.

 

Conclusion: The Myth of Voluntary Integration

 

Home Minister Amit Shah’s assertion that Kashmiris are “proudly” joining India’s constitutional framework is not just misleading—it is an affront to their decades-long struggle for dignity. The claim collapses under scrutiny when confronted with the reality of mass discontent: daily raids, enforced disappearances, and the criminalization of identity.

 

True normalcy cannot be achieved through bayonets and bureaucratic decrees. It requires addressing the political aspirations of Kashmiris, initiating dialogue with stakeholders, and respecting international law. Until then, India’s narrative of “peace” will remain a dangerous illusion, perpetuating cycles of violence and resentment. The world must look beyond state-sponsored propaganda and heed the voices of Kashmiris—voices that continue to demand freedom, justice, and the right to determine their own future.

 

The road to resolution begins with acknowledging the truth: peace in Kashmir is impossible without justice.

 

 

 

Targeting Waqf: New Threat to Muslims in India

In India’s ever-evolving political landscape, the proposed 2025 amendments to the Waqf Act have become a matter of profound concern for the Muslim community. Although presented as reforms to improve the management of Waqf properties—charitable endowments established under Islamic law—they are, in reality, part of a broader agenda to undermine the rights and heritage of Indian Muslims.

 

Historically, Waqf properties have been vital in supporting education, healthcare, and religious activities for Muslims. However, the proposed amendments threaten to dismantle this framework, realising a long-standing dream of the proponents of Hindutva, who have sought to marginalise Muslims and their institutions. Understanding this ideological backdrop is essential to grasp the true implications of the changes.

 

Since its inception, the founders of the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS) --- the main proponents of Hindutva --- have promoted a vision of India that prioritises Hindu identity over the country's secular and pluralistic foundations. This vision has often translated into policies that disenfranchise religious minorities, particularly Muslims. The amendments to the Waqf Act are part of this larger narrative, aiming to strip Muslim communities of their financial independence and administrative control over charitable properties.

 

One of the most alarming aspects of the amendments is the potential for increased state control over Waqf properties. By altering management frameworks, the government could appropriate these assets, redirecting them for purposes aligned with its political agenda.

 

This is not mere speculation. It continues a well-established trend of using state power to erode minority rights. Given the complex legal and administrative processes surrounding Waqf properties, the changes could lead to widespread mismanagement or even outright seizure by state or private interests.

 

The imbalance in the treatment of religious properties is glaring. While Waqf boards manage a vast portfolio of land and resources, Hindu temple wealth often remains unregulated and untouched. This disparity raises serious concerns about fairness and the real motives behind the amendments. It is difficult to ignore the possibility that these changes are intended to deepen socio-economic disparities, consolidating wealth and power in the hands of a select few while disenfranchising minorities.

 

Propagating RSS Agenda

 

Key political figures, including Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Home Minister Amit Shah, have long been associated with policies that favour the Hindu majority. Their close ties with major corporations, such as those led by Ambani and Adani, add another layer of complexity. Economic interests often intersect with political agendas, and the Waqf Act amendments may serve to facilitate the exploitation of Muslim lands under the guise of reform.

 

Moreover, these amendments are being proposed against a backdrop of increasing hostility towards Muslims in India. The ruling party’s rhetoric frequently frames Muslims as outsiders, creating an atmosphere of suspicion and division. In this context, the amendments represent not just a legal change but a cultural assault on the Muslim identity in India. They threaten to erase the historical significance of Waqf properties and dismantle centuries of community stewardship over Muslim heritage.

 

It is vital that Muslims and other minority communities recognise the gravity of this moment. Unity is essential to resist the amendments and protect minority rights and property. The call to action extends beyond preserving Waqf lands; it is about standing against an oppressive agenda that seeks to redefine India's social fabric.

 

Minorities, secularists, and advocates of pluralism must engage in dialogue, raise awareness, and mobilise to safeguard their heritage and rights.

In conclusion, the 2025 amendments to the Waqf Act are not mere administrative reforms; they are strategic moves aimed at disempowering Muslims further. Reflecting on historical struggles and the resilience of Muslim communities, it is crucial to remain vigilant and united.

 

The fight for rights is not just about land; it is about preserving identity, dignity, and place in a diverse and pluralistic India.The time to act is now. The future depends on the collective strength and resolve of those determined to resist the nefarious designs of the BJP and RSS in their relentless pursuit of the Hindutva agenda.Under the guise of nationalism, Prime Minister Narendra Modi and his party have systematically weaponised religious hatred, marginalising minorities and fracturing the secular fabric that has long been India's cornerstone.

 

The BJP’s tactics are insidious. They exploit communal tensions to galvanise their base while diverting attention from pressing socio-economic issues. By fostering an environment of fear and division, they seek to consolidate power at the expense of the diverse communities that make up India. The amendments to the Waqf Act are just one example of how this government seeks to undermine Muslim institutions, stripping away the rights and resources that have historically supported communities.This is not merely a political battle; it is a fight for the soul of Indian secularism. The secular values enshrined in the Constitution are under siege, as the BJP and RSS work tirelessly to replace them with a monolithic vision of India that excludes all who do not conform to their narrow definition of “Indian-ness.”

 

This dangerous path threatens not only Muslims but all those who cherish the pluralistic ethos of India.

 

 

Silenced Voices: The Crisis of Press Freedom in Kashmir

As the world marks World Press Freedom Day, Kashmir—a region entangled in decades of conflict and militarization—stands as a stark reminder of how press freedom has been eroded but systematically dismantled. For journalists and rights defenders in Kashmir, this day is less a celebration than a moment of reckoning: a reminder of vanishing truths, criminalized dissent, and the relentless suppression of voices that challenge the official narrative.

A History of Suppression, Accelerated After 2019

Press freedom in Kashmir has been more a myth than reality, clouded by censorship, intimidation, and a deeply entrenched culture of surveillance. Long before the 2019 constitutional upheaval, journalists in the region have been forced to navigate a perilous landscape, working under harsh conditions and balancing their craft on a razor’s edge beneath the shadow of systematic repression. Editors and publishers faced relentless intimidation—from arbitrary detentions and raids to the throttling of advertising revenues—as successive governments weaponized laws to silence dissent. The state’s playbook was consistent: smear critics as “anti-national,” shutter outlets overnight, and criminalize the mere act of reporting on abuses by “security” forces.

Even in earlier decades, Kashmir’s press operated under a climate of pervasive censorship, where truth-telling meant risking careers, livelihoods, and even lives. The abrogation of Article 370 did not create this crisis—it simply stripped away the pretense of rights that were never truly granted. The Indian government’s draconian measures—justified under the guise of “national security”—have transformed Kashmir into one of the world’s most militarized regions and one of the most dangerous places for journalists. The new Media Policy-2020, which mandates government scrutiny of all published content and penalizes outlets for “anti-national” reporting, has institutionalized censorship. Journalists now operate under the constant threat of raids, detention, and surveillance, forcing many into self-censorship or exile.

Detentions, Surveillance, and the Erasure of Truth

In recent years, Kashmiri journalists like Aasif Sultan, Fahad Shah, and Sajad Gul have been arrested under India’s Unlawful Activities Prevention Act (UAPA), a counter-terrorism law weaponized to criminalize reporting. Newspapers are routinely forced to trim critical coverage, while surveillance of newsrooms and individual journalists has become a new normal. The state’s iron grip ensures that stories of extrajudicial killings, torture, and mass arrests—particularly those implicating security forces—are buried before they reach the public. This deliberate erasure of truth denies Kashmiris not only their right to information but also their right to justice.

The Rise of ‘Godi Media’ vs. Marginalization of Kashmiri Journalism

While Kashmir’s press is muzzled, mainstream Indian media—often dubbed “Godi media” (lapdog media)—has become a mouthpiece for majoritarian politics. Outlets aligned with the ruling BJP and RSS amplify narratives of hyper-nationalism, Islamophobia, and militarism, reducing Kashmir to a “terrorism” trope while ignoring its humanitarian crises. After incidents like the April 2025 Pahalgam attack, where tourists were killed by unknown attackers in disputed circumstances, these outlets pivoted to war-mongering rhetoric, painting Kashmiris as threats rather than victims. Meanwhile, Kashmiri journalists striving to report on ground realities are excluded from national discourse, their voices marginalized as “anti-India” or “separatist.”

Misinformation, Fear, and the Weaponization of Hate

The consequences of this media ecosystem are dire. Misinformation and disinformation campaigns aimed at demonising the Kashmiri Muslims, normalise state violence, and fuel communal polarization continue unabated. Hate speeches by prominent TV anchors—calling for the expulsion or punishment of minorities—has become routine, emboldening vigilante violence. In Kashmir, where every headline is filtered through the prism of occupation, the press is not just battling censorship but also a psychological war to delegitimize its very existence.

World Press Freedom Day: A Call to Break the Silence

On this 30th anniversary of World Press Freedom Day, the UN’s theme—“A Press for the Planet: Journalism in the Face of the Environmental Crisis”—resonates differently in Kashmir. Here, the crisis is one of humanity: the right to speak, to mourn, and to resist erasure. Kashmiri journalists, often working without bylines or institutional support, continue to document stories at great personal risk. Their resilience is a testament to the enduring power of truth in the darkest of times.

As a Kashmiri rights activist, I urge the international community to:

• 1nfluence India to repeal laws like the UAPA and Media Policy-2020 that stifles free expression.
• Amplify Kashmiri voices in global forums, ensuring their stories are not erased.
• Hold tech giants accountable for enabling state surveillance and the spread of hate speech.
• Support independent media in Kashmir through funding and legal advocacy.

The Indian state’s assault on press freedom in Kashmir is not an isolated issue—it is part of a global authoritarian playbook to crush dissent. Today, as we honor journalists killed worldwide, let us remember that in Kashmir, the war on truth is a war on existence. Without press freedom, there can be no justice. Without justice, there can be no peace.

The writer is Chairman Kashmir Institute of International Relations (KIIR). can be reached saleeemwani@hotmail.com. X. @sultan1913

 

 

Missed Opportunity: Nationalism, Kashmir, and Legacy of Conflict

Many observers had hoped that Modi, now in his third term, would pivot toward diplomacy and conclude his political career on a high note.

In the annals of Indian political history, April 24 will be remembered as a defining turning point—a moment when the volatile mix of nationalism, military aggression, and personal ambition culminated in disaster. It was the day Prime Minister Narendra Modi, a towering figure of both acclaim and controversy, stood at a crossroads. He could have exited the political stage as a seasoned statesman. Instead, through fiery speeches, ill-timed military strikes on Pakistan and Pakistan-administered Kashmir, and their aftermath, he chose a path that led not to glory but to disgrace. Modi’s speech in Bihar on that fateful day was nothing short of a masterclass in nationalistic fervour. With emotive language and combative tone, he painted Pakistan not merely as a rival but as an existential enemy.

This brand of rhetoric, though effective in energising his political base, had dangerous implications. It fed a war hysteria that pushed India into perilous terrain. The subsequent military strikes—poorly planned and recklessly executed—resulted in civilian casualties, damage to religious sites, and extensive property loss. These were not the actions of a global statesman at the helm of the world’s largest democracy; they reflected a leader consumed by a narrow vision of nationalism, willing to forsake diplomacy for spectacle.

Modi’s approach to Kashmir has been a central—and deeply divisive—pillar of his rule. The 2019 revocation of Article 370, which stripped Jammu and Kashmir of its special status, was hailed by his supporters as bold and historic. But it failed to resolve any of the underlying issues: alienation, political disenfranchisement, and the unaddressed aspirations of the Kashmiri people. Rather than integrate, it deepened the divide. The ever-increasing military presence, the absence of political dialogue, and an administration that viewed Kashmir through a security lens instead of a human one only fuelled resentment. Instead of building trust, Modi’s government widened the gulf. April 2025’s strikes reaffirmed what many in the Valley had feared—that they remained pawns in a larger nationalist agenda, collateral damage in a game of power politics.

The strikes themselves, far from projecting strength, unravelled disastrously. The alleged downing of Indian Rafale jets—symbols of India’s modern military edge—by Pakistan’s air force and Israeli drones has exposed critical vulnerabilities in India’s strategic posture. French and Israeli industries have now faced reputational and financial setbacks. This botched show of force not only cost India its strategic edge but also soured diplomatic relations with key allies. Instead of consolidating India’s image as an emerging global power, it reinforced perceptions of reckless adventurism. The consequences extended beyond defence; they strained trade, diplomacy, and regional stability. Many observers had hoped that Modi, now in his third term, would pivot toward diplomacy and conclude his political career on a high note. Having emerged from the shadow of the 2002 Gujarat riots—where over 2,000 Muslims were killed—Modi has always walked a tightrope between developmental reformer and ideological hardliner.

The expectation was that he would seek redemption through statesmanship: improving ties with neighbours, initiating a peace process, and softening his image before retiring. But those hopes proved misplaced. Rather than reconciling, Modi escalated. Instead of healing old wounds, he inflamed them. By doubling down on a militaristic, majoritarian vision, he forwent the chance to redefine his legacy—solidifying instead a reputation built on polarisation and conflict. The irony is stark: a leader who once had the opportunity to unite chose to divide. His legacy now reflects a troubling duality. On one side are his achievements—economic reforms, infrastructure development, and his role in transforming Gujarat into a model of growth. On the other is a darker portrait: of religious divisiveness, media control, civil liberty erosion, and a foreign policy rooted more in muscle than in maturity.

This dichotomy mirrors the contradictions of contemporary India—a democracy defined by diversity yet increasingly strained by a narrow ideological narrative. Modi had the platform and the power to bridge this divide, to transcend the ghosts of his past. But instead of healing, he has chosen to haunt. The events of April 2025 serve as a cautionary tale about the dangers of unchecked nationalism and the dire costs of missed diplomatic opportunities. Modi’s rise from controversy to command, and his fall into miscalculation, offer important lessons for future leadership—not just in India but globally. When leaders put personal ambition and populist fervour above long-term peace, the result is neither glory nor greatness, but regret and reckoning.

As India looks ahead, it must search for leaders who value statesmanship over soundbites, unity over ideology, and peace over provocation. In the context of Kashmir, any lasting solution must begin with empathy, political dialogue, and a commitment to justice. The people of the Valley must no longer be seen as adversaries or symbols, but as citizens whose voices matter.India’s future will not be secured by missiles or speeches—but by vision, humility, and the courage to choose reconciliation over revenge. For Modi, that choice has already been made—and the legacy, sealed.

 

Kashmir Conundrum: Media, Missiles and Nuclear Threats

 

The horrific attack in Pahalgam, Kashmir, claiming the lives of 26 Indian tourists, wasn’t an isolated incident; it was a spark igniting a powder keg of historical grievances, geopolitical manoeuvring, and the terrifying prospect of nuclear conflict. This event has once again exposed the volatile interplay between sensationalised media narratives, aggressive military posturing, and the ever-present, chilling threat of escalation to nuclear war. The current situation is no longer simply a bilateral issue between India and Pakistan but has become a complex web of regional and global interests, demanding urgent attention and a nuanced approach. For decades, India pursued a policy of “de-hyphenation,” attempting to separate its international standing from that of Pakistan and to treat the situation in Jammu and Kashmir as an internal matter.

 

This strategy aimed to diminish Pakistan’s influence on India’s global image and limit international interference. However, the recent exchange of missile strikes – a direct and dangerous escalation – coupled with subsequent international interventions, has fundamentally re-hyphenated the two nations. Kashmir, dormant away from attention for years, has once again become a central focus of international concern, whether desired by all parties or not..This return to prominence underscores the enduring and intractable nature of the dispute.

 

The immediate aftermath of the Pahalgam attack saw a rapid escalation of military tensions. Beyond the initial condemnation and retaliatory rhetoric, both India and Pakistan engaged in demonstrable military displays, including missile tests and heightened border security. This wasn’t simply about demonstrating strength; it was a dangerous game of signalling, intended to deter the other side and simultaneously reassure domestic constituencies. However, such displays carry immense risk. The potential for miscalculation, stemming from inaccurate intelligence, faulty communication, or simply a misinterpretation of intent, is alarmingly high. A rash, emotional response, fueled by nationalistic fervour, could easily spiral out of control.

 

This is further compounded by the fact that both India and Pakistan are confirmed nuclear powers, possessing significant and growing arsenals. The doctrine of ‘Mutually Assured Destruction’ (MAD), while theoretically a deterrent, offers little comfort when faced with the realities of South Asian geopolitics. The geographical proximity of major population centres, coupled with the potential for regional instability and the involvement of non-state actors, dramatically increases the risks associated with nuclear brinkmanship. The bellicose language employed by officials on both sides, while perhaps intended for domestic consumption, only serves to exacerbate these dangers, sending alarming signals to the international community.

 

The international response to the crisis was predictably fractured. China, Turkiye, and Azerbaijan offered explicit support to Pakistan, reflecting existing strategic alignments and potentially a desire to counterbalance Indian influence. This support, while unsurprising, further complicated the diplomatic landscape. Simultaneously, Saudi Arabia, leveraging its considerable influence in the region, spearheaded Arab efforts aimed at de-escalation, recognising the potential for wider instability. The United States, under President Donald Trump, attempted to position itself as a mediator, a move driven partly by a desire to project American leadership on the global stage. Trump’s public pronouncements, while seemingly even-handed in praising both New Delhi and Islamabad, were also strategically calculated.

 

He emphasised the need for dialogue and proposed US-hosted talks, led by the Secretary of State. Crucially, he also highlighted Pakistan’s past support during the Afghan conflict, a clear signal that Islamabad retains strategic value for Washington, even amidst the ongoing tensions. This acknowledgement, while pragmatic, risked being perceived as tilting the scales and further fueling Indian anxieties. The ceasefire declared on May 10th, while a welcome development, should not be mistaken for a genuine breakthrough. It represents a temporary pause in active hostilities, a breathing space, but the underlying issues remain fundamentally unresolved.

 

The core grievances driving the conflict – disputed status of Kashmir, the aspirations of Kashmiris, and the historical mistrust between the two nations – continue to simmer beneath the surface, ready to erupt at any moment. The ceasefire is, at best, a fragile truce, dependent on continued restraint and a willingness to engage in meaningful dialogue. The root of the Kashmir conundrum lies in the incomplete partition of British India in 1947, leaving a predominantly Muslim region with a Hindu ruler, leading to conflict and ultimately, a divided territory. Decades of broken promises, human rights abuses, and political manipulation have fueled resentment and armed resistance, creating a fertile ground for violence. The media, on both sides of the border, often exacerbates these tensions, employing sensationalised reporting and nationalist rhetoric that demonise the “other” and undermine efforts towards reconciliation. Indian media houses during the current crisis were seen as spreading misinformation and looting like war rooms.

 

Addressing this complex situation requires a multi-faceted approach. The international community must move beyond superficial mediation and adopt a strategy based on genuine understanding, moral clarity, and a commitment to justice. This includes acknowledging the legitimate grievances of the Kashmiri people, promoting human rights, and fostering a climate of trust between India and Pakistan. Accountability for past atrocities is paramount. The victims of the Pahalgam massacre, and the countless others who have suffered during decades of violence, deserve justice and recognition. Ignoring their plight only perpetuates the cycle of violence and fuels further resentment. Ultimately, the question is not whether another crisis will erupt, but when. Will the world exhibit the moral courage to engage meaningfully with the root causes of disruption in South Asia, or will it once again look away, content to offer platitudes and condemnations until the next explosion shakes it from its complacency?

 

The clock is ticking, and the stakes – the peace and security of a region of over 1.6 billion people, and the potential for a catastrophic nuclear conflict – are simply too high to ignore. The future of South Asia, and perhaps the world, hangs precariously in the balance.

 

(The writer is the chairman of Kashmir Institute of International Relations (KIIR) and can be reached at: saleeemwani@hotmail.com  and on X @sultan1913)

 

A Slow Poisoning: The Deliberate Neglect of Kashmiri Political Prisoners

By Altaf Hussain Wani

The world often looks away from protracted conflicts, allowing suffering to become normalized. But the situation unfolding in Indian-administered Kashmir demands urgent attention, not for the grand geopolitical narratives, but for the quiet, agonizing deaths occurring within its jails. The plight of Kashmiri political prisoners, systematically denied adequate medical care, is not merely a legal failing – it’s a moral abrogation, a slow poisoning enacted by a state seemingly determined to silence dissent through attrition. The deaths of prominent Kashmari political leaders like Muhammad Ashraf Sehrai, Altaf Ahmed Shah, and Ghulam Muhammad Bhat are not isolated incidents. They are chilling symptoms of a deliberate policy of medical neglect, a pattern of denying essential healthcare to incarcerated Kashmiri leaders and activists.

Currently, the situation is dire. Shabir Ahmed Shah, battling prostate cancer, is being denied proper treatment. Family members are not allowed to see him or make arrangements for his treatment. Muhammad Yasin Malik, Asiya Andrabi, Nayeem Ahmed Khan, Nahida Nasreen, Fahima Sofi, and Masrat Alam Bhat and scores of others, face deteriorating health conditions, victims of a system that prioritizes punishment over basic human decency. This isn’t a case of overwhelmed healthcare systems or logistical difficulties. It’s a calculated strategy, enabled and exacerbated by draconian laws that strip away fundamental rights and facilitate arbitrary detention. The Indian state, while proclaiming itself the world’s largest democracy, is actively engaging in practices that betray the very principles it claims to uphold. The legal framework protecting prisoners, both internationally and domestically, is robust. The Universal Declaration of Human Rights guarantees the right to health and prohibits cruel treatment.

The International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights enshrines the right to life and humane treatment of detainees. Even the United Nations Standard Minimum Rules for the Treatment of Prisoners (the Nelson Mandela Rules) explicitly mandate healthcare equivalent to that available in the wider community. India’s own constitution, under Article 21, guarantees the right to life and personal liberty – a right rendered meaningless when basic medical care is withheld. The Indian Prison Manual itself mandates medical attention for inmates. Yet, these safeguards are routinely ignored in the case of Kashmiri prisoners, replaced by a callous disregard for their wellbeing. If Kashmir is viewed through the lens of international humanitarian law, as many argue, the Geneva Conventions further solidify these protections, prohibiting inhumane treatment and ensuring medical attention for those detained.

The denial of medical care isn’t simply a violation of legal rights; it’s a profound moral failing. To deliberately allow a cancer patient to suffer without treatment, to watch a prisoner’s health deteriorate due to preventable conditions, is not just negligence – it’s a form of torture, a slow and agonizing form of extrajudicial killing. The case of Khurram Parvez, a respected human rights defender imprisoned under the Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act (UAPA) and suffering from serious health problems, is particularly egregious, showcasing the deliberate targeting of those who dare to speak truth to power. The very laws facilitating this injustice deserve condemnation.

The UAPA, with its allowance for indefinite detention without trial, has become a tool to criminalize political dissent. Shabir Ahmed Shah, Yasin Malik, Asiya Andrabi, Nayeem Ahmed Khan, Khurram Parvez and others are just a few examples of individuals whose voices have been silenced through its broad and vaguely defined provisions. The Armed Forces Special Powers Act (AFSPA), granting sweeping powers and immunity to security forces, has created a climate of impunity

where enforced disappearances and custodial killings are commonplace. And the Public Safety Act (PSA), allowing administrative detention for up to two years without charge, is routinely used to incarcerate political leaders like Masrat Alam Bhat, bypassing due process and undermining the rule of law. These laws are not anomalies; they are integral to a system designed to suppress Kashmiri aspirations for self-determination. They are a blatant violation of international human rights standards and must be repealed immediately. However, legal recourse within India itself appears increasingly limited.

The judicial system, while theoretically independent, often operates under immense pressure and has shown a reluctance to intervene decisively in cases involving national security concerns. This is where international intervention becomes critical. The international community cannot afford to remain silent. The United Nations, human rights organizations like Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch, and individual governments must exert sustained pressure on India to ensure the immediate and unconditional release of all Kashmiri political prisoners, and to guarantee access to adequate medical care for those who remain incarcerated. This isn’t simply a matter of humanitarian concern; it’s a matter of upholding the principles of international law and defending the fundamental rights of all individuals. Failing to act will not only condemn more Kashmiri prisoners to suffering and death, but will also embolden authoritarian tendencies elsewhere, eroding the foundations of a rules-based international order.

The world must recognize that the slow poisoning of Kashmiri political prisoners is not a localized issue, but a symptom of a broader crisis of human rights and accountability. It’s a test of our collective conscience, and a challenge to ensure that the principles of justice and compassion prevail over political expediency. The time for quiet diplomacy is over. The time for decisive action is now.

 

Trump’s Ceasefires: Hope or Illusion?

By Altaf Hussain Wani

Love him or loathe him, it is hard to deny that Donald Trump’s unique brand of diplomacy has, at times, produced unexpected breakthroughs. After brokering a ceasefire between India and Pakistan last month, he put his stamp on truces between Israel and Iran, and, of late, now between Rwanda and the Democratic Republic of Congo. 

Yet these breakthroughs have come only after a series of quiet negotiations and behind-the-scenes efforts by key regional players. The Israel-Iran ceasefire seeks to end a deadly war that brought the Middle East to the brink of a catastrophic regional conflict, offering a glimmer of hope for ending a confrontation that has cost many lives and devastated civilian infrastructure.

The hard-won peace deal has triggered global optimism, with world leaders expressing hope that this fragile ceasefire might pave the way for a lasting diplomatic solution to the region’s challenges. UN Secretary-General António Guterres has offered the organisation’s resources to help monitor the agreement — a clear sign of the international community’s longing for peace.However, concerns remain over the truce’s durability. Iran’s commitment appears conditional on Israel’s adherence to its obligations, while Israel’s official response remains ambiguous. The underlying mistrust that has long defined their relationship casts a shadow over this tentative peace. The absence of a formal, signed accord further deepens the fragility of the arrangement.

Without sustained diplomacy and a shared commitment to address the root causes of conflict, including the deeper Middle Eastern disputes that have festered for generations, this ceasefire risks being little more than a temporary pause in hostilities.President Trump may talk of lasting peace across the Middle East, but such aspirations are futile unless the long-standing issue of Palestine is resolved. Israel’s brutal military campaigns in Gaza, combined with a crippling blockade that has left 93% of children — nearly a million — at risk of famine, not only deepen the humanitarian crisis but also jeopardise the very foundation of the ceasefire.

While the truce has brought a temporary halt to immediate hostilities, it remains a fragile accord. Without a just, inclusive solution that upholds the legitimate rights and dignity of the Palestinian people, the ceasefire will eventually unravel, putting regional stability and global peace at grave risk.

The unresolved question of Palestinian statehood remains a formidable obstacle to lasting peace. Decades of conflict have inflicted unimaginable suffering, displaced millions, and stoked fury across the Muslim world. The growing anger at Israel’s aggression is not merely a passing phase of outrage — it is a ticking time bomb that could, at any moment, ignite a wider conflagration involving multiple regional actors.

The peace is illusory not only because of a lack of a sustainable framework supporting the ceasefire but also because of the unpredictable politics US and its unjust support to Israel.

Roadmap for Real Peace

Achieving genuine, long-term peace in the Middle East demands serious, sustained efforts by Israeli and Palestinian leaders, supported by meaningful international engagement. Cosmetic measures or attempts to shift responsibility will only entrench mistrust and delay an inevitable reckoning.

The global community — and Israel in particular — must recognise the Palestinian people’s legitimate right to dignity and sovereignty. A viable peace plan, supported by global powers, is essential if we are to break the cycle of violence and secure a future free from conflict.Failure to address this core dispute leaves the door open to proxy forces, regional interference, and the risk of a full-scale war that would carry catastrophic human and economic costs.

In the same way, a real peace in South Asia between India and Pakistan is dependent on dispensing justice to the people of Jammu and Kashmir. Trump’s recent offer to mediate on Kashmir has rekindled hope for a more stable region.It is essential that all stakeholders seize this opportunity to engage in genuine, results-oriented dialogue. Only then can we hope to prevent the kind of disaster that nearly unfolded when India and Pakistan were brought to the brink of war following an attack on tourists in Pahalgam.

For decades, the people in conflicting regions have endured unimaginable suffering in pursuit of rights denied to them by a world that too often turns away. Their legitimate political aspirations cannot be ignored forever. The time for half-hearted gestures is over. Peace in the Middle East and South Asia is not merely a regional necessity — it is a global imperative.It is time to reject the systematic injustice, to abandon jingoism, and to let peace prevail. Without a just and honourable way that recognises the rights of people, peace will remain a distant dream, and instability will continue to haunt the Middle East and South Asia.

 

Kashmir’s Calculated Calm: BJP’s Chessboard and Illusion of Choice

The air in Kashmir is thick with anticipation — but it is an anticipation carefully curated and stage-managed. Whispers of statehood restoration, the rise of a new political alliance, and fleeting moments of international attention feel less like organic developments and more like chess pieces moved with precision, with New Delhi’s hand firmly guiding the board. The restoration of statehood is floated as a possible concession. Yet in truth, the ruling BJP is engineering a fractured political landscape designed not to empower Kashmiris, but to preserve its own grip on power. What is offered to the people of Kashmir is not genuine internal self-determination — but the illusion of choice.

 

The formation of the so-called People’s Alliance for Change (PAC), led by Sajad Lone, Chairman of J&K Peoples' Conference (JKPC), is no grassroots uprising. It is a calculated manoeuvre. The BJP understands this, even if some prefer to portray it otherwise. With elements linked to the banned Jamaat-e-Islami incorporated into its ranks, the PAC is less about articulating a unified Kashmiri vision and more about creating an alternative to the National Conference (NC) and the People’s Democratic Party (PDP) — alternatives that can be managed, divided, and played off against each other.

 

The narrative being subtly pushed is clear: the NC and PDP have failed. The NC, despite its 2024 electoral success, is branded as complacent, unwilling to challenge New Delhi with conviction. The PDP, forever haunted by its past alliance with the BJP, is seen as irreparably tainted. In this space of deliberately fostered disillusionment, the PAC emerges as a ‘fresh’ alternative — but one that ultimately serves the BJP’s long-term plan.

 

Let us be frank. The BJP does not seek a strong, unified opposition in Kashmir. It prefers a scattering of smaller parties, each chasing influence, each vulnerable to pressure and compromise. This fragmentation allows New Delhi to avoid clear mandates, to pick and choose allies, and maintain its grip through proxy governance and tactical coalitions. The benefits for the BJP are obvious: divided mandates, increased bargaining power, weakened traditional power centres, and a carefully maintained fiction of ‘normalcy’ masking deep control.

 

The talk of restoring statehood during the monsoon session of Parliament is no act of generosity. It is a well-timed distraction, a carrot to divert attention from the stick — the continued erosion of autonomy and tightening control. Should statehood be restored, it will likely come with caveats, ensuring Delhi’s oversight and influence remain intact. This is not about the restoration of rights; it is about the preservation of control.

 

The PAC’s chances of success, despite pockets of support in North and South Kashmir, are slim. Lone’s JKPC commands some loyalty, but the JDF’s links to a banned organisation alienate mainstream voters. The challenge is not merely mobilising Jamaat sympathisers — it is overcoming the deep distrust that such associations provoke. As for the PDP, its path back to relevance is steeper still. The stain of its alliance with the BJP runs deep, and the party cannot hope to recover with mere words of contrition. It requires a bold, visionary platform that speaks to Kashmiri aspirations — a platform that convincingly breaks with its compromising past.

 

The international dimension adds another layer. The recent US offer of mediation, following a brief flare-up on the border with Pakistan, is unlikely to shift Delhi’s approach. Rather, it offers an opportunity for New Delhi to project openness abroad, even as it pursues its hard-line strategy at home.Kashmir stands at a critical crossroads. The months ahead will decide whether the region moves towards regaining statehood or genuine representation, or settles into a new normal of controlled politics and managed dissent. The real question is also not if statehood will be restored — but under what conditions, and at what cost.

 

New Delhi must recognise that lasting peace and stability in Kashmir cannot be secured through fragmentation and manipulation. Only genuine political engagement, a sincere commitment to addressing grievances, and the restoration of rights can break the cycle of distrust and resentment. Without this, today’s calculated calm risks giving way to tomorrow’s storm. The chessboard may be set, but the game is far from over. And the people of Kashmir deserve far more than to be pawns upon it.

Elected but powerless: Farce of democracy in Kashmir

 

Omar Abdullah’s barred entry to a historic graveyard on Martyrs’ Day reveals the illusion of autonomy and the deepening disenfranchisement of the Kashmiri people.

 

The iconic image of Jammu and Kashmir Chief Minister Omar Abdullah scaling the locked gates of the historic Naqshband Sahib Martyrs’ Graveyard has struck at the heart of Kashmir’s political tragedy. Despite being an elected leader, an unelected administration led by New Delhi’s representative Lt Governor Manoj Sinha did not allow him and his ministers to visit the graveyard to commemorate the martyrs, who laid down their lives on July 13, 1931 and became the frontrunners of the first political movement in Kashmir.

 

This wasn’t merely about a barred visit to a commemorative site. It was the most symbolic reminder of how elected authority in Kashmir remains utterly hollow, reduced to theatre, stripped of substance, and disempowered by design. July 13 marks a defining moment in Kashmiri history. It honours the memory of 22 martyrs who, in 1931, rose against the oppressive Dogra monarchy—a moment widely regarded as the beginning of Kashmir’s political awakening.

 

For decades, this day was officially commemorated as Martyrs’ Day by successive governments, recognising the movement’s place in the region’s collective consciousness. The fact that Omar Abdullah, an elected leader, was prevented from honouring these martyrs by the very system that claims to uphold democracy is more than an insult—it is an indictment of that very system.

 

 

The state’s actions on this day are not isolated. They are part of a systematic project underway since the abrogation of Article 370 on 5 August 2019. This move stripped Jammu and Kashmir of its special status and statehood, transforming it into a Union Territory and bringing it under the direct control of the central government. New Delhi hailed the move as a path to development and integration. In practice, it has meant lockdowns, arrests, communication blackouts, and the steady erosion of political and civil rights.

 

Chief Ministers, former and serving, including Omar Abdullah and Mehbooba Mufti, were detained without charges for months. Elected representatives continue to be sidelined, interrogated, and at times imprisoned. Those who challenge the dominant narrative are branded subversive. What remains is a political landscape managed not by those chosen by the people, but by bureaucrats and officers appointed by New Delhi.

 

Nowhere is this clearer than in the role of the Lieutenant Governor—an unelected official who commands sweeping authority over nearly every facet of governance in the Union Territory. The Chief Minister, the DDCs, and the legislative assembly—restored in name but not in power—are unable to challenge or reverse his decisions. The Lieutenant Governor has become, in all but name, a modern-day viceroy.

 

 

Omar Abdullah’s locked-out visit underscores the absurdity of the current political arrangement. If an elected Chief Minister cannot pay tribute to martyrs without prior clearance, what does that say about the autonomy and relevance of elected office? What remains of democracy if its institutions are stripped of power, and its leaders function under surveillance and constraints?

 

The larger project, it seems, is not merely about central control but the cultural and historical erasure of Kashmir’s distinct identity. From altering school curricula to renaming places, and now, restricting access to symbols of resistance like the 1931 martyrs’ graveyard, the state’s efforts suggest a concerted attempt to homogenise, if not rewrite, Kashmiri history. Under the guise of integration and development lies a deep-seated project of assimilation—one that leaves little room for dissent, memory, or local agency.

 

This is why the phrase “empowerment through elections” rings hollow for many Kashmiris today. Elections, once a potential vehicle for change, have become instruments of validation for a predetermined political script. Votes are cast, but power resides elsewhere. Assemblies are formed, but policy decisions flow from Delhi. The disillusionment this breeds is palpable. To participate in an electoral process that offers no real power is to walk a tightrope between hope and futility.

 

Jammu and Kashmir Chief Minister Omar Abdullah climbing the fence to enter Martyrs' Graveyard to pay respect to martyrs of July 13, 1931 in Srinagar on Monday, July 14, 2025. Kashmir Leaders Locked as Police Block July 13 Martyrs' Day Commemorations Jammu and Kashmir Chief Minister Omar Abdullah climbing the fence to enter Martyrs' Graveyard to pay respect to martyrs of July 13, 1931 in Srinagar on Monday, July 14, 2025.

The Way Forward in Kashmir is Talking to all Leaders Across Spectrum: A S Dulat International observers, meanwhile, are too often pacified by the optics of the electoral process: a few televised rallies, ink-stained fingers, and a declaration of voter turnout. What they miss is the deeper story—the institutionalised disempowerment of those elected, the censorship of history, and the subtle but relentless dismantling of Kashmiri identity under administrative orders.

 

The Martyrs of 1931 stood for dignity, political rights, and resistance to autocracy. The decision to prevent access to their memorial is not just an act of bureaucratic overreach—it is a statement. It says that even memory is now regulated. That mourning, when politically inconvenient, is to be policed. And that history, unless it fits the central government’s preferred narrative, is to be forgotten.

 

If India is serious about presenting itself as the world’s largest democracy, then Kashmir cannot be its blind spot. The restoration of political agency in Jammu and Kashmir cannot be symbolic—it must be structural. Elected representatives must be given actual authority. Cultural and historical identities must be respected, not erased. And the right to dissent, commemorate, and self-define must be restored, not suppressed.

 

The ghost of July 13 will not be buried behind locked gates. It remains a call—a call for justice, autonomy, and dignity. Until that call is answered, democracy in Kashmir will remain a façade, and its people, elected yet disempowered.

 

Cracks in Ice: Cautious But Meaningful Gesture Toward Indo-Pak Peace

A recent conference in Delhi offers a flicker of hope for regional de-escalation—but for dialogue to be meaningful, it must move beyond symbolism, institutionalise inclusion, and give Kashmiris a seat at the table.

A recent cross-border conference convened in New Delhi by veteran peace advocate O P Shah offered a rare, if understated, sign that at least at non-official expert levels India and Pakistan are willing to reopen channels of dialogue—however cautiously. Featuring former diplomats, politicians, and retired military officials from both countries, the event was notable not for any dramatic breakthrough, but for its tone, timing, and quiet symbolism.

Pakistani delegates, though restricted to virtual participation due to prevailing diplomatic constraints, were part of wide-ranging conversations that challenged the hardened rhetoric of recent years. Even if such conferences do not result in immediate policy change, they often act as bellwethers—nudging discourse away from belligerence and back toward engagement. In a region perennially poised on the edge of catastrophe, small gestures matter. And the fact that such an event was permitted in the political heart of India signals a degree of openness, however measured, to rethinking the ‘no-talks’ approach that has dominated in recent years.

The timing could not have been more pertinent. The region has only just stepped back from the brink following a tense military standoff. The rhetoric on both sides has remained inflammatory, and New Delhi’s unilateral revocation of Jammu and Kashmir’s constitutional status in 2019 continues to cast a long shadow. Against this backdrop, the Delhi conference served as a modest but meaningful pause. Participants discussed a broad set of regional issues, with a particular focus on Kashmir. There were calls for the restoration of constitutional guarantees such as Articles 370 and 35A, the return of statehood to Jammu and Kashmir, and—critically—the resumption of people-to-people contact and communication channels.

There was a clear recognition that military solutions are not only futile but dangerously short-sighted. What is needed instead is statesmanship, pragmatism, and a willingness to include Kashmiri voices—long marginalised in this dialogue.

Why does it matter?

Since 2019, both formal and informal diplomatic channels have largely broken down. The ensuing silence has allowed hawkish voices on both sides to fill the vacuum, fuelling further hostility and mistrust. In this context, the Delhi gathering—though limited in scope—offered a crucial platform for civil society voices to reassert the value of dialogue.

Such exchanges, even when unofficial, can help reduce the trust deficit and re-energise constituencies that have long championed peace at great personal cost. However, one must not mistake symbolic progress for substantive change. Without high-level political will—especially from India—these efforts will remain peripheral. India’s insistence on linking dialogue with terrorism concerns has repeatedly stalled any structured engagement. As a result, outstanding disputes—particularly Kashmir—remain unresolved, festering into deeper insecurity and volatility.

Track-II diplomacy, which involves some sanction from official channels once a useful tool for breaking deadlocks, has been actively discouraged in recent years—especially by New Delhi. Once-promising initiatives have struggled for relevance as political space has shrunk and nationalism has become ascendant. While individuals like O P Shah and institutions like the Jinnah Institute have kept the flame alive, their efforts in recent times have rarely translated into any policy impact.

India’s entrenched position on Kashmir as an “integral part” of the Union leaves little room for honest engagement. Meanwhile, the region continues to reel under a heavy security footprint, with freedoms curtailed and political voices muzzled. The consequences have been grave—deepened alienation, rising despair, and the steady erosion of democratic space.

Push for institutionalised dialogue

The Delhi conference is no panacea for the deeply entrenched problems facing South Asia. But it does suggest a possible thaw—an opportunity, however tentative, as every participant urged for rethinking the current impasse, implying that all measures taken post August 5, 2019, have not worked.

What came out of the meeting is that participants agreed that dialogue must be institutionalised. That means creating a structured, inclusive, and durable framework for talks—one that is shielded from electoral cycles and the vagaries of domestic politics. They called for reviving Track-II and back channel efforts, which must be complemented by Track-I commitments grounded in political will and diplomatic seriousness. Any peace process that sidelines the people of Jammu and Kashmir is doomed to fail. For decades, talks have been conducted over Kashmir, not with Kashmiris. This exclusion has delegitimised proposed solutions in the eyes of those who live with the conflict daily.

Kashmiris—across all communities and regions—must be recognised as essential stakeholders. Their aspirations, whether rooted in autonomy, rights, or dignity, must form the bedrock of any future agreement. The restoration of democratic freedoms and the inclusion of local voices are not just moral imperatives—they are strategic necessities.

The recent dialogue in Delhi may not have made headlines, but it deserves notice. In a region where silence has too often signalled escalation, even tentative conversation is a welcome shift. But to build real peace, we must go further. Symbolism must give way to structure. Rhetoric must yield to realism. And Kashmiris must be moved from the margins to the centre of the conversation. Only then can the subcontinent hope to break free of the cycles of mistrust, conflict, and missed opportunity that have defined its modern history.

 

 

 

 

Occupied, overpowered; Kashmir’s military siege

India’s decision to deploy 20,000 additional Central Reserve Police Force (CRPF) troops in occupied Jammu and Kashmir reflects a troubling pattern of perpetual militarization in a region already saturated with armed forces. With nearly a million military and paramilitary personnel stationed there, this overwhelming presence is widely regarded as both a cause and consequence of the ongoing violence, bloodshed, and human rights violations. The recent move to raise 20 new CRPF battalions goes beyond a routine security measure. It reveals a deeply entrenched totalitarian mindset that sees military expansion as the primary tool for control. Instead of addressing political grievances through dialogue, the Indian government continues to rely on force, reinforcing its grip over a region that remains internationally recognized as a disputed territory.

It is important to note that India already maintains around 900,000 troops (including military and paramilitary forces) in occupied Kashmir, making it the most militarized zone in the world (as documented in JKCCS reports from 2012, 2015, 2017, and 2019). This number surged in 2019 when nearly 80,000 additional personnel were deployed following the revocation of Article 370. Today, the ratio of Indian soldiers to Kashmiri civilians stands at approximately 1:10—an extraordinary and deeply unsettling figure that often goes unnoticed.

The massive troop presence has not only contributed to widespread rights violations but has also facilitated land expropriation on an alarming scale. Tens of thousands of acres of land have been seized from Kashmiris, undermining their livelihoods and displacing families from their ancestral homes. The Indian army is believed to have grabbed over 54,000 acres, with laws altered to allow permanent construction on occupied land. According to India’s Defence Ministry, as of recent figures, 56,615 acres of land in Jammu and Kashmir are under the control of defence departments and organizations. This number excludes land held by the Central Armed Police Forces (CAPF). In the 2018 Legislative Assembly session, then Chief Minister Mehbooba Mufti stated that over 21,400 hectares (52,879 acres) were under unauthorized occupation, while an additional 18,846 hectares were officially sanctioned for defense use.

Other concerning developments include:

a. In May 2017, 7.5 acres of state land belonging to JKHPMC were leased to the CRPF
b. On July 4, 2017, the J&K High Court permitted the Army to construct permanent structures at a transit camp in the ecologically sensitive Sonamarg area.
c. In the week leading up to the abrogation of Article 370 in August 2019, 100 companies of CAPF were deployed, and media reports suggested even more followed.

Troop Deployment Timeline
a. pre-2019: 500,000–750,000 Indian troops stationed in Kashmir.
b. 2019 Surge: Nearly 80,000 more deployed post-abrogation
c. 2021: Thousands more, including 2,500 CRPF and 5,000 BSF personnel.

These deployments have raised serious concerns about their impact on civilian life, political rights, and environmental sustainability. The large-scale occupation of land for military use has affected housing, livelihoods, and access to public spaces. It has also led to the degradation of ecologically fragile zones due to construction and troop mobilization. The government’s militarized approach is part of a broader strategy to silence dissent and suppress Kashmiri aspirations for self-determination—an internationally recognized right guaranteed to them under multiple UN resolutions. Far from resolving the conflict, New Delhi’s recent actions have deepened mistrust and fears of being annihilated, particularly among the region’s Muslim majority population.

The region’s tragic history demonstrates that India’s sledgehammer policy has consistently failed to address the root causes of unrest—including denial of self-determination, socio-political repression, and rights abuses. The government’s strategy of delegitimizing Kashmir’s resistance and ignoring the aspirations of its people has only escalated tensions.

Recent Standoff Between India and Pakistan

The recent standoff between India and Pakistan further underscores the precarious situation in the region. India, under pressure from domestic opposition and left alienated by its international allies, has resorted to creating chaos through militarization and the weaponization of free speech and dissent. This approach not only exacerbates tensions but also undermines prospects for peace and stability.

Costs of Militarization

The consequences of militarization on Kashmiri society are profound: It has deeply impacted society, leading to widespread human rights violations, psychological distress, and a pervasive sense of insecurity. The troops’ concentration in populated and highly sensitive areas has led to:

a. Human Rights Violations: Arbitrary detentions, torture, and custodial killings have become tragically common.
b. Displacement & Livelihood Disruption: Militarization has disrupted traditional livelihoods, including farming and fishing, particularly in ecologically sensitive areas like lakes and forests.
c. Environmental Impact: Deforestation, pollution, and habitat loss have surged due to unchecked military construction
d. Educational Disruption: Schools and universities have been shut or occupied, affecting access to education.
e. Mental Health Crisis: Constant surveillance and violence have led to increased cases of PTSD, depression, and anxiety.

A Way Forward

Given the region’s history, India needs to recognize ground realities and acknowledge the fact that militarization cannot solve the Kashmir dispute that continues to pose a threat to peace and security in the region and beyond. A just and durable settlement of the long-drawn conflict requires a fundamental shift from coercion to consultation. This involves:
a. Engaging in sincere, inclusive dialogue with Kashmiri political leadership across all spectrums.
b. Addressing human rights violations and holding security forces accountable.
c. Involving local stakeholders in peace-building to ensure a long-term solution.
d. Demilitarizing sensitive zones to restore civilian life and protect the environment.

Sadly, New Delhi’s refusal to acknowledge ground realities and its reluctance to engage in meaningful dialogue with key stakeholders has significantly narrowed down the space for peaceful resolution. Its overreliance on force has fuelled humanitarian crises, stifled freedoms, and prolonged instability in the region.

Without a strategic reorientation toward diplomacy, justice, and inclusive governance, the conflict in Kashmir will continue to fester—with serious implications not just for Kashmiris, but for regional and global peace.

Author: Altaf Hussain Wani is the chairman of the Islamabad-based think tank, the Kashmir Institute of International Relations (KIIR).

 

 

Beyond the Brochure: The reality of Kashmiris progress and development

By Altaf Hussain Wani

Since the abrogation of Articles 370 and 35A in August 2019, occupied Jammu and Kashmir has been thrust into a new political reality. The erstwhile state was bifurcated into two Union Territories, and the reins of governance were handed over to Lieutenant Governor. The Indian government and the LG administration have since embarked on an aggressive campaign to project Kashmir as a region transformed—a land of development, freedom, and democracy. However, beneath the glossy brochures, jingles, and memes lies a starkly different reality, one that Bashir Dada, a Kashmiri poet, writer, and actor, has courageously exposed through his poignant poetry in a social media post.

Dada’s post on facebook titled “Who Will Tell You About Your Failures?”, is a scathing critique of the LG administration’s governance. It pierces through the veneer of propaganda and lays bare the systemic failures, civic neglect, and the erosion of political and cultural rights in Kashmir. His words are a reminder that while the government celebrates its “triumphs,” the ordinary people of Kashmir continue to endure hardship, silence, and injustice.

The Illusion of Development

The LG administration has been quick to tout its “lofty dream projects”—tunnels, flyovers, and infrastructure developments—as symbols of progress. Yet, as Dada poignantly points out, these projects often come at the cost of Kashmir’s heritage, environment, and livelihoods. Hotels and shopping malls rise like “concrete insults” over irrigation channels, while orchards and fields are replaced by parking lots. The so-called development is not for the people of Kashmir but for the benefit of a select few, often funded by contracts that bypass local hands.

The government’s narrative of progress is further undermined by the lack of basic amenities. Contaminated water, unmanaged stray dogs, and crumbling municipal services are daily reminders of the administration’s failure to address fundamental civic issues. As Dada writes, while the LG sips accolades, the common people are left “sipping disease.”

The Erosion of Civic and Political Rights

The abrogation of Article 370 was justified as a step toward integrating Kashmir into the Indian mainstream and ensuring equal opportunities for its people. However, the reality on the ground tells a different story. The LG administration wields absolute executive power, rendering elected representatives powerless. Even the Chief Minister and his colleagues can be placed under house arrest at the administration’s whim, let alone ordinary citizens.

Freedom of expression has been severely curtailed. Journalists, as Dada notes, have been “gagged,” their pens rusted with censorship. Newspapers have been reduced to mere forums for government press releases, and dissent is met with intimidation and repression. Poets, writers, and artists, who once celebrated Kashmir’s rich cultural heritage, are now forced to “rhyme to survive” and “sketch silence on government walls.”

The Silence of the Elected and the Selected

One of the most glaring failures of the LG administration is its inability to foster genuine political engagement. The “elected” representatives are powerless, and the “selected” bureaucrats are silent. Everyone clamors for statehood, but no one wants to take responsibility for the people’s plight. The administration’s governance is marked by submission, not service, with files held hostage in a “bureaucratic graveyard.”

Traffic management, a basic civic function, is emblematic of the administration’s inefficiency. As Dada writes, “even death must wait its turn” while VVIP cars with blaring sirens take precedence. The common people’s cries are drowned out by the noise of protocol and the indifference of those in power.

The Last Whispers of Truth

In this atmosphere of repression and propaganda, Bashir Dada’s poetry stands as a beacon of truth. His words remind us that the microphone of dissent, though muffled, is not entirely silenced. The common people of Kashmir, who “no longer even hope, only endure,” are the last ones left to whisper the inconvenient truths.

The LG administration’s narrative of normalcy is a myth, carefully crafted to obscure the ground realities of repression, neglect, and systemic failure. It is time for the government to move beyond self-congratulatory rhetoric and address the genuine grievances of the people. Until then, the voices of poets like Bashir Dada will continue to expose the chasm between the government’s claims and the people’s lived experiences.

The question remains: Who will tell t the Modi regime and his appointed Lt Governor about their failures? In a land where dissent is met with brutal suppression, those who dare to speak the truth often vanish—their bodies washing up on riverbanks or their voices silenced behind the cold bars of distant Indian jails. Journalists, poets, and activists risk everything to expose the harsh realities, yet the administration continues its relentless campaign of repression. But how long can this silence be enforced? How long before the weight of unspoken truths shatters the illusion of control? The people of Kashmir endure, but their whispers are growing louder. One day, even the deafening machinery of propaganda will not be enough to drown them out.

 

Write is chairman Kashmir Institute of International Relations (KIIR) and can bereached :- saleeemwani@hotmail.com

 

 

Banning Truth: War on Kashmir’s Memory

By Altaf Hussain Wani

Banning these books is an act of desperation, betraying a state’s fear of an informed citizenry, yet history will endure in hidden manuscripts, digital archives, and whispered memories.

The prohibition of 25 books in Jammu and Kashmir—including works by Arundhati Roy, A.G. Noorani, Sumantra Bose, and Tariq Ali—is not just censorship, but an attempt to control history, silence scholarship, and erase the collective memory of a people. The ban, imposed under the pretext of preventing “secessionist narratives” and the “glorification of terrorism,” criminalises research, suppresses documented truths, and seeks to rewrite the record of Kashmir’s political and human rights history. This is not a defence of national security—it is a bid to justify the present by reshaping the past.

When a state fears books, it fears the truth. When it outlaws literature that documents human rights abuses, political grievances, and historical realities, it exposes its own insecurity. These books do not incite violence; they expose it. They do not distort history; they record it. Silencing these voices does not protect democracy—it dismantles it. 

The works targeted in this ban include historical accounts, constitutional and legal analyses, and personal testimonies. None of them advocates violence. They provide informed perspectives on Kashmir’s political struggle, India’s military policies, and the lived experiences of people under occupation.

Book lovers seeing some publications during Chinar Book Festival 2025 in Srinagar. Image is representational.

J&K bans 25 books citing ‘false narrative’ and ‘glorification of terrorism’

1.  The Kashmir Dispute 1947–2012 – A.G. Noorani

A renowned constitutional expert, Noorani offers a meticulous examination of Kashmir’s legal and political history, from the contested accession to India’s failure to hold the promised plebiscite. He writes: “What the people of Kashmir desire is self-rule. The present arrangements do not give them the feeling that they have got it. The feeling may be justified or unjustified; the important point to note is that it exists, and as long as it exists, the problem of Kashmir will remain unsolved. On the issue of accession, it is necessary to remember a few facts. The accession of Kashmir is not of the same type as the accession of other States. It is a limited accession restricted only to three subjects: defence, foreign affairs and communications.”

2. Kashmir: The Case for Freedom – Tariq Ali, Arundhati Roy, et al.

This anthology gathers essays from prominent scholars and journalists on the militarisation of Kashmir. Roy writes: “To call Kashmir an ‘integral part of India’ while stationing half a million soldiers there, enforcing curfews, and criminalising dissent is Orwellian. No democracy should fear its own history.” Does this amount to terrorism—or is it simply a fearless indictment of state repression?

3. Kashmir at the Crossroads – Sumantra Bose

Bose, a political scientist, examines the conflict through historical, political, and geopolitical lenses. He observes: “The Indian state’s reliance on brute force—mass arrests, pellet guns, and draconian laws—has only deepened alienation. Peace cannot be achieved by erasing memory.”

If such analysis is banned, it speaks volumes about the government’s hostility to intellectual freedom.

Book lovers seeing some publications during Chinar Book Festival 2025 in Srinagar. Image is representational. The state insists these books spread “false narratives.” Yet their findings align with reports from international human rights organisations. If the United Nations and Amnesty International are not considered “anti-India,” why are books citing their reports banned? The answer is clear: the state cannot tolerate scrutiny.

The book ban is part of a wider campaign since the revocation of Article 370 in August 2019—a campaign aimed at dismantling Kashmir’s autonomy and identity:Media gag: Journalists arrested, newspaper offices raided, critical reporting silenced. Digital censorship: Frequent internet shutdowns, social media restrictions.

Cultural erasure: Renaming landmarks, rewriting textbooks, and now, banning books. Book lovers seeing some publications during Chinar Book Festival 2025 in Srinagar. Image is representational. When Books Become Threat: Who Fears Kashmir’s Written Word? A fascimile of the book, “A Dismantled State: J&K After Article 370”. A fascimile of the book, “A Dismantled State: J&K After Article 370”. Photo/Harper Collins

This is not governance but a thorough control that indulges in:

1. Violation of Free Speech (Article 19)

India’s Constitution guarantees freedom of expression. Book bans require proof of incitement to violence. Courts have overturned bans before—for example, in Aveek Sarkar v. State of West Bengal—but Kashmir’s legal and political isolation makes resistance harder.

2. Criminalising Scholarship

If historians like Noorani and Bose are considered dangerous, should Indian scholars criticising British colonialism also be silenced? Should The Discovery of India be banned for its critique of imperial rule?

3. Ethical Bankruptcy

A healthy democracy thrives on debate, not on enforced silence. As journalist Anuradha Bhasin, whose book is among those banned, writes: “When you ban books, you admit you have no counter-argument. You confess your fear of the truth.”

Therefore, banning of these books is an act of desperation. It reveals a state that fears an informed citizenry. But history is resilient. It will survive in hidden manuscripts, in digital archives, and in whispered oral histories. The international community must speak out against this censorship. Academics, journalists, and civil society must continue to challenge it. Because when books are banned, the real crime is not sedition—it is the state’s fear of its own people. The battle for Kashmir’s memory is far from over. It has only just begun.

  

 

The Himalayan Deluge: A Shared Crisis that Demands Coordinated Action

By Altaf Hussain Wani

India and Pakistan must move beyond the blame game, insulate conflict from climate adaptation and work unitedly to present the Himalayas from being washed away.

 

The roaring floodwaters that tore through Dharali in Uttarakhand, Kishtwar in Jammu and Kashmir, and Neelum valley in Azad Jammu and Kashmir this August did not check for passports. The landslides that buried homes in Gilgit-Baltistan and Himachal Pradesh were indifferent to the Line of Control (LoC). As the Himalayas weep, they send a devastatingly clear message: the climate crisis, a challenge that overshadows our political disputes, has arrived, and it is hitting our shared, fragile rooftop with a fury that our divided houses cannot withstand.

For decades, the conflict over Kashmir has been framed in terms of territory, sovereignty, and security. But the recent spate of catastrophic events, detailed in harrowing reports from both sides of the border, necessitates a grim reframing. The greatest threat to the people of Kashmir, and by extension to the hundreds of millions downstream in India and Pakistan, is no longer just the soldier’s gun, but the melting glacier, the bursting cloud, and the collapsing mountain. The evidence presented is overwhelming and terrifyingly symmetrical. In mid-August 2025, as a cloudburst claimed a family of six in Muzaffarabad and left over 500 tourists stranded in the Neelum Valley, similar tragedies were unfolding across the LoC.

In India, flash floods decimated villages, washing away roads and bridges leaving at least 56 people dead, and 300 missing in just one incident in Kishtwar. In Pakistan, the National Disaster Management Authority reported over 300 deaths since the monsoon began, with families in Bajaur and Ghizer suffering the same cruel fate as those in Uttarakhand. The names change—Ratti Gali, Kheer Ganga, Jagran Nullah—but the story is the same: a wall of water and debris, a community shattered, and a government response struggling to cope. We have become dangerously comfortable with the term ‘cloudburst,’ using it as a convenient scapegoat. As journalist Nidhi Jamwal rightly points out, this deflects from the real issue. The mayhem is not caused by a single weather event but by a systemic failure to heed scientific warnings.

Scientists have been crying themselves hoarse about the accelerated melting of Himalayan glaciers, which could lose up to 75% of their volume by 2100. This melting creates vast, unstable glacial lakes, ticking time-bombs for Glacial Lake Outburst Floods (GLOFs). The disaster at South Lhonak Lake in Sikkim was a deadly preview. Yet, the Indian Himalayan Region remains a “data-dark zone,” a black hole of information precisely where we need it most. This data vacuum is not a scientific accident; it is a political choice.

The very region that serves as the water tower for a billion people is one of the most militarized and least cooperative places on earth. How can we possibly create a robust early warning system for floods when the nations sharing the watershed refuse to share hydrological data in real-time, citing security concerns? How can we build climate-resilient infrastructure when resources are perpetually diverted to maintaining military positions on the Siachen Glacier, a dying relic whose melt water ironically threatens the very people it is meant to protect?

The political distrust runs so deep that it poisons the well of potential cooperation. Amid this unfolding environmental catastrophe, India and Pakistan remain locked in a Cold War mindset. Mutual accusations of “water aggression” persist and the Indus Water Treaty hangs in limbo. Whether these claims are fully accurate or part of a broader narrative of grievance, they underscore the toxic atmosphere.

The Indus Water Treaty, a rare example of past cooperation, is now viewed with suspicion rather than as a foundation upon which to build. This is misplaced. The Indus, Jhelum, and Chenab rivers, whose headwaters lie in the disputed territory, are the shared arteries of North India and Pakistan. A GLOF event eastern Jammu and Kashmir (Indian side) will inevitably send a devastating pulse of water into Pakistan. A degraded watershed in western Jammu and Kashmir (Pakistan side) will increase siltation and flood risk downstream in Punjab.

Continuing this conflict is an act of collective self-harm. We are fiddling while our shared home burns—or rather, drowns. The immediate and overwhelming vulnerability of the region’s population demands a radical shift in priorities. We need to move beyond blaming each other for the floods and start building a shared ark.

The first step must be to declare a “climate ceasefire.” The conflict in Kashmir must be insulated from the urgent, life-saving work of climate adaptation. This would open the door for what is desperately needed: joint mechanisms. India and Pakistan must establish a joint glaciological research canter focused on the Himalayas, pooling satellite data, field reports, and scientific expertise. They must create and operate a unified, cross-border early warning system for GLOFs and flash floods, with transparent data-sharing protocols that can save lives in Muzaffarabad as quickly as in Kishtwar.

This isn’t a call for an immediate resolution to the final political status of Kashmir—a goal that has remained elusive for 78 years. It is a pragmatic call for humanitarian and environmental cooperation as a precursor to peace. By working together to map vulnerable glacial lakes, engineer safer infrastructure, and manage watersheds, both nations can build trust, reduce risk, and demonstrate a commitment to the well-being of all people in the region, regardless of which side of a line they live on.

The mountains are speaking. The families mourning their dead, the tourists stranded by washed-out bridges, and the farmers watching their fields disappear under silt are all casualties of a dual crisis: a changing climate and an unchanging conflict.

 

Clinging to old animosities is no longer a viable policy it is a suicide pact. The choice is stark: continue to glare at each other across a militarized line as the waters rise, or turn together to face the storm.

]

 

 

Whitewashing War Crimes Under Cloak of Objectivity

By Altaf Hussain Wani

“To the living we owe respect; but to the dead we owe only truth.” —Voltaire

 

The newly released report by the Save Youth Save Future Foundation (SYSFF), presented as if it were a dispassionate study of unmarked graves in Jammu and Kashmir, is anything but objective. Far from shedding light on one of the most tragic chapters of the conflict, it reads like a carefully crafted attempt at narrative management — one that seeks to obscure established facts, downplay serious violations, and repackage official versions of events as truth.

 

By selectively citing data, ignoring victims’ testimonies, and privileging police files over independent investigations, the report attempts to erase crimes that demand impartial scrutiny. These are not minor infractions, but grave violations of international law — enforced disappearances, extrajudicial killings, and mass burials of unidentified persons. Such crimes have been documented for decades by Kashmiri civil society, international rights groups, and even statutory bodies of the Indian state. To overwrite those findings with untested claims is not only misleading but dangerous.

 

Any assessment of the human rights situation in Jammu and Kashmir must begin by acknowledging the lived reality of its people. For more than three decades, Kashmir has been one of the world’s most militarised zones. Civilians live under constant surveillance, subject to night raids, arbitrary detentions, and the ever-present fear of disappearance. Torture, custodial deaths, and collective punishments — including the destruction of homes and livelihoods — have left deep scars on Kashmiri society. This is the context in which the debate over mass graves must be situated.

 

These graves are not abstract statistics; they are the silent markers of untold suffering, the resting places of men and boys who never returned home. For their families, they represent an absence without closure — a husband who never came back from work, a son who vanished after being picked up at a checkpoint, a brother who disappeared during a search operation.

 

To label such individuals posthumously as “foreign militants” without evidence is to deny families both dignity and truth.SYSFF claims to have “identified” more than 90 per cent of the 4,056 graves it studied in four districts as belonging to “terrorists”. This claim stands in stark contrast to the findings of multiple independent and official investigations.

 

The State Human Rights Commission (SHRC), in its 2011 report, documented 2,730 unmarked graves in just three districts. Crucially, it admitted that not a single body had been identified by police or civil authorities.The Association of Parents of Disappeared Persons (APDP) and the Jammu Kashmir Coalition of Civil Society (JKCCS) painstakingly documented more than 6,000 unmarked graves across all ten districts of the Valley between 2008 and 2012. Their work included hundreds of victim testimonies, affidavits, and on-the-ground surveys.

 

The International People’s Tribunal on Human Rights and Justice in Kashmir (IPTK), in collaboration with forensic experts, demonstrated how graves contained civilians with signs of execution — blindfolds, gunshot wounds to the head, and no identification records. The European Parliament Sub-committee on Human Rights, during its 2009 on-site hearings, concluded that the Indian state was failing to fulfill its obligation under international humanitarian law to identify the dead and inform families.

 

Against this backdrop, SYSFF’s sweeping assertion that almost all the bodies are “terrorists” is extraordinary. It is made without DNA testing, without exhumations, without judicial enquiries — the very processes mandated by Indian law under the Criminal Procedure Code (sections 174–176). In effect, it rewrites history without evidence.

 

Relatives of suspected rebels killed by Indian forces visit a graveyard in Sonamarg, a remote mountainous resort in Jammu and Kashmir.

Book Ban: State silences Jammu and Kashmir Funding and Credibility

 

A deeper look at SYSFF’s own financial disclosures raises serious questions. More than 90 per cent of its work is in collaboration with the J&K Police Wives Welfare Association and the Indian Army’s Goodwill work. This is not an incidental detail. It means that the very institutions implicated in the disappearances and mass burials are bankrolling the “research” that absolves them. In no serious jurisdiction would such a conflict of interest be tolerated.

 

Unlike independent rights groups, which often face harassment, raids, and the freezing of accounts, SYSFF operates with full state backing. Its sudden emergence and quick access to official files suggest less a grassroots initiative and more a top-down project of damage control. What is missing from SYSFF’s report — and what no amount of official labelling can erase — are the voices of Kashmir’s families of the disappeared. Since the 1990s, the APDP has collected over 1,400 testimonies from relatives of men who vanished after being taken into custody.

 

Mothers, fathers, wives, and children continue to gather every month in Srinagar, holding faded photographs of their loved ones. Many of them have submitted blood samples for DNA testing, but the authorities have never matched those samples with the bodies in mass graves.

 

Some stories are seared into public memory. In 2003, two young men from Uri disappeared after being picked up by the army. Years later, when two graves were exhumed in 2012, forensic experts confirmed the remains belonged to them. Both had been blindfolded and shot in the head. Their families’ long wait for the truth was vindicated, but such exhumations remain the rare exception rather than the rule.

 

Relatives of suspected rebels killed by Indian forces visit a graveyard in Sonamarg, a remote mountainous resort in Jammu and Kashmir. In Conversation with Nigara Mirdad: An Exiled Diplomat’s Voice from a Silenced Nation International Legal Obligations

 

International law is clear on how states must deal with unidentified remains and suspected cases of enforced disappearance. The International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights obliges India to investigate every custodial death. The Minnesota Protocol on the Investigation of Potentially Unlawful Death (2016) requires independent exhumations, forensic analysis, and public identification of remains. The UN Working Group on Enforced or Involuntary Disappearances has repeatedly warned that labelling the disappeared as “terrorists” without judicial determination violates the presumption of innocence.

 

By ignoring these standards, both the Indian state and SYSFF deepen the wound. The dead remain unacknowledged, the families remain without answers, and perpetrators continue to enjoy impunity.

 

SYSFF’s report cannot be separated from the broader politics of denial that have marked New Delhi’s approach to Kashmir. For decades, the government has sought to delegitimise Kashmiri grievances by framing them as security threats rather than rights violations. Reports of torture are dismissed as propaganda, demands for justice are labelled “anti-national”, and now, even the graves of the disappeared are reclassified as “evidence” of militancy.

 

This narrative management is not accidental. It is a strategy to shield the state from accountability — both domestically and internationally. By producing an “NGO report” that confirms the official line, the government can claim that civil society itself has validated its version. In reality, this is a hollow exercise, one that collapses under the weight of independent evidence.

 

Relatives of suspected rebels killed by Indian forces visit a graveyard in Sonamarg, a remote mountainous resort in Jammu and Kashmir.

Arundhati Roy: The Voice The State Wants Silenced Why Truth Matters

 

Truth-telling is not an academic exercise. For the families of the disappeared, knowing the fate of their loved ones is a basic human right. It allows them to grieve properly, to perform last rites, and to find some measure of closure. For society at large, confronting the truth is essential to prevent repetition. Impunity breeds repetition: silence allows crimes to continue.

 

By contrast, suppressing the truth not only dishonours the dead but also corrodes the living. It erodes trust in institutions, deepens alienation, and signals to security forces that they can act without consequence. The cost is borne by every Kashmiri who continues to live under occupation, never knowing if they will return home at night.

 

Three simple facts remain unchallenged:

 

1.    The SHRC, India’s own statutory body, confirmed thousands of unidentified graves and demanded DNA profiling.

 

2.    Independent Kashmiri and international organisations have provided evidence of civilians executed in custody and secretly buried.

 

3.    No systematic forensic investigation has ever been conducted, despite repeated calls from the UN, European Parliament, and civil society.

 

SYSFF’s report ignores all of this. Funded by police and army bodies, it re-labels the dead without evidence, presenting speculation as fact. It is not truth-telling but truth-burying.

 Voltaire’s dictum is a call to conscience: “To the living we owe respect; to the dead we owe only the truth.” The people of Kashmir continue to demand the truth. Suppressing it through propaganda does not make the graves disappear. It only deepens the injustice, prolongs the suffering of families, and stains the moral credibility of those who choose denial over accountability.

 

If there is to be any hope of reconciliation, the truth about Kashmir’s mass graves must be confronted — not buried under the comforting fiction of official narratives. Until that happens, the cycle of repression will continue, and the promise of justice will remain a distant dream.

 

 

Crown on Your Head, Thorn on Public

By Altaf Hussain Wani

Dear Mr Omar Abdullah,

 

The people of Jammu and Kashmir did not elect you in the October 2024 assembly elections out of affection or faith. Had that been the case, you would not have lost the Baramulla-Kupwara Lok Sabha seat just a few months ago to Engineer Abdul Rashid.

 

People voted you in the assembly polls for something larger—against the arrogance of majoritarian Delhi, against the steady dismantling of their identity, against the suffocation of their dignity. When they pressed the button beside the plough symbol, it was not out of forgiveness for the Abdullah dynasty—the rigged election of 1987, the broken promises, and the corruption are not forgotten. It was out of desperation, believing that even a flawed shield was better than no shield at all.

 

But it now looks like they have miscalculated.

 

Today, as Kashmir is hollowed out—its books banned, its shrines seized, its youth jailed under draconian laws—you sit in Srinagar, tweeting indignation as though you were an opposition leader in a far-off democracy. But you are not in opposition. You are the Chief Minister. The blood on the streets, the silence in the mosques, the erasure of our language—all take place under your watch. Your condemnations sound hollow, almost obscene.

 

Let us be clear about what you have allowed:

 

·       When the BJP-government introduced the Waqf Amendment Bill to seize Muslim religious endowments, you raised no meaningful resistance.

 

·       When your own MLAs were detained under the same Public Safety Act (PSA) that your family governments once wielded against ordinary Kashmiris, you offered meek protests.

 

·       When books by Kashmiri writers were banned, you held press conferences but risked nothing.

 

·       When Hazratbal, the most sacred symbol of Kashmiri Muslim identity, was taken under Delhi’s grip, you merely wore your cap to Friday prayers and called it resistance.

 

The cap on your head is not a crown of leadership. It is a costume, and the people see through it.

 

Nobody expected you to reverse August 2019 changes. We knew you could not restore Article 370 or 35A. We knew you could not bring back the dead or undo demographic engineering. But there was still a fragile hope that you could slow the bleeding, that you could at least stand between Kashmir and complete absorption into the Hindu Rashtra project.

 

Instead, you have become the velvet glove covering the iron fist. Delhi points to your presence as proof of “normalcy” while dismantling every institution of Kashmiri life. Your administration provides the fig leaf of democracy while the reality on the ground is colonisation. This is not the first time. In 1999, you justified your alliance with the BJP by claiming you could “moderate” them. That claim has curdled like milk in the Kashmiri summer. They did not moderate. They consumed you. They used your legitimacy to accelerate the very project you once promised to resist.

 

Your rival-turned-partner, Mehbooba Mufti, also bears responsibility. She was the one who justified an alliance with the BJP as a “bridge to Delhi” and who surrendered Muslim Auqaf institutions to the same forces now weaponising them. She, too, now wraps herself in the cloak of resistance. But Kashmir remembers. We remember the tears shed for the cameras and the compromises behind closed doors.

 

Both of you helped Delhi finish what it began on 5 August 2019: the conversion of Jammu and Kashmir from a semi-autonomous state into a colony administered through local collaborators.

 

Choices You Refused

You had other options. When new criminal laws were imposed to replace the IPC and CrPC in Kashmir, you could have refused to implement them. When Waqf properties were seized, you could have resigned in protest. When your MLAs were jailed, you could have marched to the prison gates and refused to leave until they were freed.

 

You did none of this. You chose survival. But what survives is not Kashmir—only your chair. You speak of restoring statehood as if redrawing the map were the solution. Kashmir’s wounds are not geographical. They are about dignity, history, faith, and memory. A return to statehood without the right to exist as a people is just another cage, and you are its keeper.

 

Do the young men languishing in prison for attending funerals not haunt your nights? Do the mothers of the disappeared—whose sons vanished in the 1990s and whose grandsons now vanish again—remain unheard in your conscience? Do you not feel the suffocation of writers whose books are banned, of preachers whose sermons are censored, of scholars whose research is criminalised?

 

Perhaps you tell yourself this is pragmatism. But pragmatism without principle is simply collaboration by another name. Collaboration always extracts a price, not just from the collaborator but from the entire community that dared to hope. The cap on your head is fraying. The crown on Delhi’s head grows heavier with each of your compromises. Between them lies the battered body of Kashmir—still breathing, still bleeding, still waiting for leaders worthy of its sacrifice.

 

History will not be kind. But history’s judgment is for tomorrow. The urgent question today is: Will you spend what remains of your time in office as Delhi’s accomplice, or will you at last stand between your people and their annihilation? The choice is yours. But remember this: Kashmir is watching. And Kashmir remembers.

 

Kashmir’s Twin Unrest: Reform vs. Resistance

By Altaf Hussain Wani

The intense protests in Pakistan-administered Jammu and Kashmir (PaJK) in 2022 and 2025 began as an organised, civilian movement led by traders, teachers, transporters and community groups under the banner of the Joint Awami Action Committee (JAAC).

Their grievances were tangible: high electricity tariffs, rising food prices, poor public services, and entrenched corruption. Their 38-point charter of demands focused on subsidies, local management of hydropower revenues, open-merit educational admissions, and the abolition of special privileges for the political elite. It was a broad-based civic campaign for accountability, not an uprising against the constitutional order.

Initially, the government’s hesitant response allowed resentment to spread. By 2024, federal intervention became unavoidable. The process culminated in the October 4, 2025, agreement, a significant political document that committed billions in funds for electrification, new educational boards, healthcare improvements, infrastructure feasibility studies, and compensation for victims of past clashes. The deal also promised to review police cases and alleged abuses through judicial oversight, while establishing a Monitoring and Implementation Committee to ensure compliance. On paper, it was a comprehensive step toward reform and reconciliation.

The test, however, lies in implementation. Delays in budget releases, bureaucratic inertia and political bargaining could still erode trust. If the monitoring committee lacks teeth or transparency, the pattern of protest followed by partial concessions could recur, deepening disillusionment. Across the Line of Control, the picture is starkly different. In Jammu and Kashmir, the core issues are political and existential. Since August 5, 2019, when India revoked Jammu and Kashmir’s semi-autonomous constitutional status, residents have faced sweeping administrative, legal and demographic changes under an intense security clampdown.

Civil liberties have been sharply curtailed. Preventive detentions, media restrictions, and repeated communication blackouts have become tools of control. International human rights organisations and United Nations experts have documented serious allegations of abuse, arbitrary detention and collective punishment. While some protests take civic or humanitarian forms, the central grievance is about political disenfranchisement, not so much about electricity bills or food subsidies. The instruments of redress here are political dialogue, constitutional guarantees, and human rights protections, not just local policy reform.

This difference in context and motivation means that responses must differ, too. Governance fixes can work in PaJK; they cannot substitute for political dialogue across the LoC.  Three practical reasons make it essential to separate the two narratives. 

First, the solutions diverge.

PaJK’s challenges are administrative and distributive: ensuring services, transparency, and fair resource allocation. They can be addressed through sound policy, fiscal reforms, and participatory governance. In contrast, in J&K, grievances concern rights, representation, and the legitimacy of political authority. They require legal, constitutional and international engagement.

Second, messaging matters.

Equating PaJK’s reformist movement with anti-state militancy risks delegitimising genuine civic activism. Likewise, portraying struggle in Kashmir across the LoC as a demand for better services rather than for political rights misrepresents its core. Accurate framing helps policymakers and the media avoid deepening misunderstanding.

Third, credibility is at stake.

For Islamabad, addressing governance gaps in PaJK is both a moral and strategic imperative. A transparent, responsive administration strengthens its case when raising human rights concerns internationally. Conversely, failure to deliver on domestic promises undermines diplomatic standing and public faith alike.

The October 4 agreement offers a roadmap, but its success depends on follow-through. Three tests will determine whether it marks real progress:

·       Transparency and timeliness: Public disclosure of budgets, project plans, and quarterly progress reports by the Monitoring Committee.

·       Accountability: Independent judicial review of past violence, fair treatment of detainees, and impartial anti-corruption oversight.

·       Civic inclusion: Involving JAAC and other community representatives in monitoring implementation and service delivery.

If these principles guide the next phase, PaJK could emerge as a model of responsive governance in a region where trust in authority is fragile. On the other side in Jammu and Kashmir, the levers for change are fewer and the obstacles greater. The international community faces the limits of its influence, constrained by geopolitical interests and India’s firm rejection of external mediation. Nevertheless, consistent, evidence-based human-rights monitoring, quiet diplomacy, and support for local civil society remain vital. Independent journalism, legal aid for detainees, and international advocacy through UN mechanisms can help protect the space for peaceful dissent.

Grand resolutions may be out of reach, but incremental progress — reducing arbitrary detentions, restoring communication freedoms, and enabling local governance — can still make a measurable difference.The temptation to fold every Kashmiri protest into a single storyline is understandable but misleading. The crises of PAJK and J&K are connected by history and emotion, yet they are distinct in cause and remedy. One demands better governance and fair resource sharing; the other seeks dignity, rights, and political recognition.

Recognising that distinction is not an attempt to divide the Kashmiri, but to make it intelligible — and to respond to each part with the tools it requires. For PaJK, that means accountable governance and the faithful execution of reform pledges. For J&K, it requires sustained, rights-based engagement by both regional and international actors. Only when these approaches move in tandem — good governance where it is possible, justice where it is due — can stability, trust and peace begin to take root on both sides of the divided valley.

 

Kashmir’s Carceral Colonisation: When prisons become weapon of war

By Altaf Hussain Wani

 

By every metric that defines a modern democracy, the Indian state has failed Kashmir. But ‘failure’ is too soft a word. What we witness is a calculated, ideological project in which Hindutva has penetrated every pore of the state—military, police, executive, civil society, and, most tragically, the judiciary—turning Kashmir into the world’s largest prison complex, where surveillance, militarization, and collective punishment are deployed as weapons of war against an entire people.

Thousands of Kashmiris—politicians, poets, preachers, even children—languish in jails, from the notorious Tihar Jail to shadowy prison complexes scattered across the Indian mainland. Their crime is not terrorism. Their only crime is speaking truth to power and demanding the right to decide their political future, a right long promised to them in United Nations Security Council resolutions. The numbers are staggering, but numbers rarely stir consciences. What should haunt the civilized world is the woeful plight of Kashmiri prisoners including men and women who have been forced to spend major portion of their lives in the dark dungeons of Indian prisons for their political beliefs. The world rightly celebrates Nelson Mandela for enduring an imprisonment of 28 years, yet remains silent about Kashmir’s political prisoners many of whom have endured incarceration for over 33 years.

For instance: Masarrat Aalam Butt, Chairman of the All Parties Hurriyat Conference: he has spent twenty-eight of the past thirty-three years behind bars—most of them without trial. Muhammad Yasin Malik, Chairman of the Jammu and Kashmir Liberation Front, is serving a life sentence for ‘waging war against India’—a charge that would be laughable. Shabir Ahmed Shah, often called the ‘Nelson Mandela of Kashmir,’ has spent more than half of his life—thirty-six years—in Indian detention centres and torture cells. Nayeem Ahmed Khan, an engineer by training, has endured repeated detentions and torture, and now faces the same farcical charge of waging war against India. And women like Aasiya Andrabi and Naheeda Nasreen are punished not just for their politics but for being women—their incarceration in distant jails outside the Valley is not only a travesty of justice but also an atrocious assault on Kashmiri motherhood.

Similarly, Kashmir’s noted human rights defender Khurram Parvez—accused of terrorism by the Indian state—has nevertheless earned international recognition as a leading voice for human rights. Today, his name figures prominently among the world’s most respected rights defendersThe legal architecture of this repression n, built on a regime of draconian laws, is as sophisticated as it is sinister. Take the Public Safety Act (PSA), AFSPA and the Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act (UAPA): they are not laws—they are licenses and instruments of a control—designed to silence dissent without a shred of accountability. Under the PSA, a person can be jailed for two years without trial, on nothing more than suspicion of being a ‘threat to security.’ The UAPA goes further, criminalizing thought itself: membership in any organization the state bans—even retroactively— can land a person in prison for decades. Together, these laws have created a parallel legal universe where Kashmiri Muslims are guilty by birth, and innocence is not even an option.

But laws are only as brutal as the society that enforces them. In India, the Hindutva has cemented its hold over every arm of the state. The Indian military, once ostensibly neutral, now operates as an RSS shakha in uniform. Soldiers post TikTok videos of themselves torturing Kashmiri youth; generals give interviews calling for the “Israeli model” in Kashmir. The police, long communalized, now function as a Hindu militia with state salaries.

In jails, this extremist ideology has taken a grotesque form. Reports indicate that Hindu inmates—often convicted murderers and rapists—are enlisted by jail authorities to terrorize Kashmiri prisoners. During Ramzan, when prisoners attempt to pray, these criminals are encouraged to desecrate the Quran and hurl slurs. Shabir Ahmed Shah, a 71-year-old leader, was beaten unconscious in Tihar for refusing to chant ‘Jai Shri Ram.

Unfortunately, the Indian judiciary, once the last hope for victims of state repression, has now become Hindutva’s most reliable ally. In Kashmir, courts function as cogs in the machinery of repression. The Supreme Court of India, which rushes to protect the rights of Delhi rioters and Gujarat rioters, has not heard a single habeas corpus petition from Kashmir in five years. When it does, it offers platitudes: “National security” trumps liberty, “terrorism” is whatever the state says it is. In 2020, the court upheld the detention of 4G internet in Kashmir for a year, arguing that “terrorists might misuse faster internet.” This is not law; it is legalized apartheid.

Meanwhile, the country’s civil society has been pushed to the margins in a deliberate effort to colonize it. Meanwhile, India’s jails have become crematoria of Kashmiri aspiration. In 2021, 70year-old Muhammad Ashraf Sehrai, a senior Hurriyat leader, died in Jammu jail after being denied medical care, his family barred from seeing his body. In 2022 Mr. Altaf Ahmed Shah a senior leader met the same fate because he was also not provided proper health care at initial stages of cancer.   In 2023, Tabarak Hussain, a mentally ill man from Azad Kashmir, was killed in army custody; his body was returned with organs missing.

This is not just about Kashmir. It is about the future of India itself. When a state can jail thousands simply for demanding that its promises be honored, when courts can legalize indefinite detention, when society cheers the torture of prisoners, the fault lies in a state system that continues to suffer from its colonial hangover. Hindutva’s project in Kashmir is a laboratory for the rest of India. The same laws used to crush Kashmiris are now being deployed against Muslims in Delhi, Christians in Chhattisgarh, and dissenters everywhere in India.  Kashmiris are not the only victims of what can rightly be called a settler-colonial project. Dalits, Adivasis, Muslims, and farmers—all are targets of Hindutva’s majoritarianism. It is high time to build solidarity across India’s oppressed communities and unite against this relentless onslaught.

No prison, however vast, can silence ideas. As long as mothers in Srinagar sing lullabies of freedom, as long as children n in Baramulla and elsewhere in the Valley dream of Azaadi, the struggle endures.What Kashmiris have endured for decades now serves as a forewarning of what awaits all of us if Hindutva’s march goes on unchecked. What Kashmiri prisoners endure in cells stand as a warning, their silence a deafening scream. The question is no longer whether India will hear—it is whether we have the courage to listen and to say no to the majoritarianism mindset that seeks to forge a homogeneous society under Hindutva.

 

Shabir Shah: Kashmir’s Nelson Mandela

By Altaf Hussain Wani

Shabir Ahmed Shah—one of the most defiant voices that for decades resonated against India’s neo-colonialism in Kashmir—has now been completely silenced in New Delhi’s Tihar jail, the notorious prison complex that has virtually become a death trap for Kashmiri prisoners. Hailed as the ‘Prisoner of Conscience’ for spending more than half of his life (37 years) behind bars while advancing a just cause, Shah embodies the enduring struggle of a nation held captive for decades under a neo-colonial order, which was imposed through deceit, deception and Machiavellian intrigue. His incarceration is not merely the silencing of an individual. It is part of a systematic campaign to crush dissent, dismantle indigenous political leadership, and erase the collective will of Kashmiris striving for their right to self-determination.

Born into a modest middle-class family in south Kashmir’s Islamabad—the city of springs that has produced many brilliant minds—Shah received his early education at Government Middle School, Sarnal. He later completed his higher secondary examination at M.I. Higher Secondary School. However, he could not pursue further studies as his association with various students’ leagues led to repeated imprisonments at a very young age. Shah’s journey as an anti-status-quoist began in the late 1960s when, along with close associates, he formed the Young Men’s League. He later joined the Jammu and Kashmir People’s League, which mobilized the masses and organized massive protest rallies against the Indira-Abdullah Accord in 1975. Shah himself led several demonstrations. For this, he was arrested and kept in jail for months before being released. In early 1982, when the People’s League launched the Quit Kashmir Movement, he was re-arrested. The move sparked widespread demonstrations across the Valley and brought life to a standstill for five days. During an international cricket match in Srinagar in October 1983, Shah once again raised the banner of defiance. He led protests against the government, which resulted in yet another arrest in 1984.

Amidst a decade of growing Indian influence, repeated political interventions, and systematic sabotage, Shah emerged as an uncompromising leader of Kashmiri resistance. He inspired countless young minds who came to realise that resistance was the only viable path to challenge India’s illegal occupation and imperial presence in the region. By the late 1980s, Kashmir had entered a decisive phase of political upheaval. The rigged 1987 elections denied the people their democratic voice and pushed the Valley into mass revolt. Shah was once again at the forefront. His uncompromising stance against India’s occupation made him a prime target of the state machinery. Authorities resorted to a cycle of arrests and detentions to neutralize his influence.

Throughout the 1990s—a period marked by relentless state repression—Shah spent most of his time in prison. Amnesty International and other rights groups referred to him as the “Prisoner of Conscience,” a recognition of his lifelong imprisonment for political beliefs rather than any crime. Unlike many others who shifted positions under pressure, Shah remained unbending. Resistance for him was not a tactic but an article of faith. Even behind bars, Shah’s name reverberated across the Valley. His sacrifices inspired new generations to join the struggle, making him a living embodiment of Kashmir’s spirit of defiance. The Indian state, however, saw in him not just a dissenter but a threat to its entire narrative of control. Every release was swiftly followed by another arrest. This cycle of incarceration turned his personal life into a saga of resilience and sacrifice.

He commanded massive public support. In 1994, following his release from Indian custody, he received a heroic welcome across Kashmir. Hundreds of thousands of people greeted him in towns and cities. Former RAW chief A. S. Dulat remarked in his book that the people followed him “like a pied Piper,” underscoring his extraordinary influence. A man of masses, Shah did not believe in drawing room politics; he was always in the midst of his people, whether leading protest demonstrations or sympathizing with victims of state repression.

Shah was also the first Kashmiri leader from the resistance camp to engage directly with the Indian government. Holding talks at a crucial and sensitive time, he displayed both courage and commitment to exploring political avenues for resolving Kashmir’s conflict. To build support within Indian civil society, Shah met leaders across the political spectrum and engaged extensively with the intelligentsia. Yet, despite his long legacy of adopting dialogue as a preferred tool for settlement, he was branded a “rabid fanatic and a Pakistani agent.” These labels were used to build a dossier against him, later invoked to justify his imprisonment. In addition to jailing him, the government confiscated his properties, tightening the noose around one of Kashmir’s most prominent political voices.

Guided by the principle of unity in diversity, Shah embarked on a series of public contact drives. He engaged with various communities and regional parties to forge a broader consensus on Kashmir’s future. As a strong proponent of unity, he worked tirelessly to bring all parties under a single banner. His efforts stressed the importance of collective action, recognizing that enduring solutions require broad-based support. Despite hardships, he never compromised on principles. Offers of compromise from Indian leaders—including promises of autonomy, economic packages, and political favors—were firmly rejected. Shah maintained that no solution within the Indian Constitution could replace Kashmiris’ right to self-determination.

Shah’s principles extended beyond politics. He is the only Kashmiri known to have refused an Indian passport. For him, declaring Indian nationality was impossible in a region whose status remains disputed internationally. He also refused to participate in Indian-supervised elections in Kashmir, viewing them as illegitimate attempts to undermine the people’s right to decide their own future. Between 2000 and 2017, Shah continued to advocate Kashmir’s right to self-determination. His politics remained firmly rooted in principle. He refused to compromise despite constant harassment, raids, and arrests. During the mass uprisings of 2008, 2010, and 2016, he was repeatedly placed under house detention, forced to live in isolation and cut off from the outside world. His voice was finally reduced to the confines of jail in July 2017, when Indian authorities booked him in a fictitious case from which he had already been exonerated by an Indian court.

Since then, he has been held in Tihar Jail, repeatedly denied bail despite the National Investigation Agency (NIA) failing to produce any substantial evidence. His refusal to compromise, his rejection of material incentives, and his prioritization of collective goals over personal ambitions set him apart as a leader of rare integrity.

For his people, Shabir Ahmed Shah remains the living embodiment of Kashmir’s enduring struggle for justice and self-determination. His journey shows that true leadership is not measured by titles or power but by sacrifice, moral courage, and the ability to uphold justice even under the harshest conditions.

Through decades of struggle, Shah has carved out a unique place in Kashmir’s contemporary history. Before his people, he assumed a larger than life image owing to his indomitable role and peerless contribution to the cause of peace and justice. Now in his seventies, Shah has been censored, condemned, and vilified by the Indian state—but never defeated. Even in captivity, he stands as a beacon of resistance, conscience, and courage for Kashmir and beyond.

 

Nayeem Khan: A Brilliant Strategist of Resistance, Caged in Tihar

By Altaf Hussain Wani

In Delhi’s notorious Tihar Jail, Nayeem Ahmed Khan—a prominent Hurriyat leader whose life embodies unyielding resistance—has been left to languish under the haunting shadows of a dark cell for past seven years; without trial or formal conviction, denied access to justice and the basic principles of fair play. His continued and illegal imprisonment is nothing but a deliberate attempt to silence him and the ideology he represents.

Khan, who heads Jammu Kashmir National Front, is now in his late fifties, carries a lifelong legacy of political struggle dating back to his student day. His story is not merely one of personal endurance, but of a deep-rooted commitment to the cause of his people, forged in the crucible of Kashmir’s turbulent history. Currently held in the notorious Tihar Jail, his year’s long incarceration marks another chapter in a life largely spent behind bars, yet never silenced.

 

Khan’s journey into the heart of Kashmir’s resistance movement began during his college years in Srinagar. While pursuing a diploma in engineering, it was not blueprints and circuits that captured his imagination, but the resounding call for justice and selfdetermination echoing across the Valley. It was then that he joined the Islamic Students League, quickly rising to become its president. This early step was more than youthful idealism; it was the continuation of a family legacy steeped in resistance. His father, the late Ghulam Muhammad Khan, was a close associate and jail companion of the legendary revolutionary leader, Maqbool Ahmed Bhat. This paternal connection to the iconic martyr profoundly influenced Nayeem, instilling in him the principles of unwavering dedication and sacrifice that would define his life.

After his time with the Islamic Students League, Khan’s path led him to the Jammu

Kashmir People’s League, wherein he became an indispensable figure, a close associate of Shabir Shah, one of the most prominent resistance leaders. Khan’s role went far beyond that of a follower; he emerged as a principal architect, an accomplished organizer, and above all, a shrewd strategist behind the movement.

He played a monumental role in organising the People’s League, transforming it from a nascent group into a formidable force. Crucially, he understood the power of projection, working tirelessly to establish Shabir Shah’s stature as a leading voice of the resistance. Khan’s strategic mind and tireless efforts were instrumental in building the very foundations upon which much of the valley’s political movement would stand.

His commitment, however, came at a steep personal price. Incarceration became a recurring theme in Nayeem Ahmed Khan’s life. He has been jailed numerous times, spending the majority of his adult life behind bars. Yet, each release saw him emerge not broken, but resolute. He would step back into the public eye, immediately resuming his work, organising rallies, mobilising support, and keeping the flame of resistance alive. His resilience became legendary. He understood that physical confinement could never imprison an idea or a spirit.

 

Beyond his organizational prowess, Khan possessed a visionary understanding of the importance of narrative and information. Recognizing the necessity of media in amplifying the Kashmiri voice to the world, he took a bold and unprecedented step. He invested the party’s funds into publishing the first-ever English daily newspaper from the Kashmir Valley. It was not just a business venture but a revolutionary step, a direct challenge to the information blockade and a crucial platform for articulating the aspirations and grievances of his people to a global audience.

Even his critics, a testament to his character, concede that Nayeem Ahmed Khan has never wavered in his principles. Detractors—some within the resistance itself—have accused him of being too uncompromising, too unwilling to bend to shifting political winds. Yet this very refusal to dilute his demands, to barter away the right to self-determination for personal freedom or political convenience, is what has earned him the deepest respect among the youth.

In a landscape fractured by factionalism, Khan was seen as a rare constant: the man who never cut a deal, never disowned the gun when the gun was the only voice left, and never disowned the people when the gun was taken from them. His last imprisonment came as a result of carefully plotted trap by the Indian agencies. By early 2017 the Indian security grid had begun labelling him in their dossiers as “the new mobiliser,” while many in the Hurriyat old guard began to ask if the apprentice had outgrown his mentors.

On 30 May 2017, Times Now’s prime-time bulletin detonated the severest trial of Nayeem Khan’s life. Grainy, secretly filmed clips—shot, the channel claimed, with hidden cameras—at different place and different weathers, talking about financial transection . Within minutes the footage was viral, the National Investigation Agency had slapped him with the explosive charge of “waging war against the state,” and every screen in India replayed the same damning loop. Instead of capitulating, Khan converted the ambush into a masterclass in crisis control, turning the moment of apparent ruin into the opening move of a fierce political fight.

Far from crumbling under the pressure, Nayeem Khan navigated the ensuing storm with strategic precision. The broadcast sent shockwaves through the Hurriyat camp, prompting a hurried midnight meeting of Hurriyat. Hurriyat faction suspending him “pending explanation” was widely seen less as a disciplinary action and more as a panicked move. Through it all, Nayeem Khan maintained his poise, treating the legal and political onslaught not as a defeat but as a platform. He understood the power of narrative a moment of alleged vulnerability into a testament of his influence—a man whose reach and impact were significant enough to warrant such a concerted effort to undermine him. He emerged not diminished, but as a formidable figure who could indeed change the tides, knowing that true leadership is proven not in calm waters, but in the heart of the storm.

Aware that the state’s architecture—and even some of his own colleagues—disapproved, Nayeem also knew that many others stood with him. Meeting the crisis head-on, he toured Budgam’s central district, drawing thunderous crowds to rallies where he saluted the fallen freedom-fighters. Friends of the struggle were quick to praise the tour as masterful damage-control—and to credit Nayeem with turning the moment into leadership.

India may lock up Nayeem Khan and others like him, but it can never cage the ideals and ideology, which remain deeply etched in the Kashmiris’ collective memory.

 

UN experts sound alarm over HR Situation in Kashmir and beyond: Will India heed to the call?

By Altaf Hussain Wani

A rare and sobering communication from twelve United Nations human rights experts has pierced the global noise, issuing a stark warning that can not be ignored. Referenced as AL IND 8/2025, this document is far more than a routine diplomatic correspondence; it is a meticulous and damning indictment of a new wave of violence and human rights violations unfolding in Indian-occupied Jammu and Kashmir and targeting Muslim communities across the country in the aftermath of the tragic Pahalgam attack in April 2025.

This is not a partisan accusation but a structured, evidence-based appeal from the world’s top independent authorities on counter-terrorism, arbitrary detention, executions, and freedom of expression. Their collective voice transforms scattered reports into a coherent pattern of state-sanctioned abuse, raising urgent questions about India’s commitment to the rule of law and its international human rights obligations.

The experts lay out a chilling catalogue of alleged crimes. The security response to the Pahalgam attack appears to have discarded justice in favour of a brutal, collective punishment. The detention of nearly 2,800 individuals—including journalists and activists—without due process, using draconian laws like the UAPA and PSA, is a recipe for injustice. The reported 54 extrajudicial killings and deaths in custody point to a climate of impunity where torture and summary punishment have allegedly become routine.

Perhaps most shockingly, the communication documents the demolition of homes—a tactic of collective punishment explicitly condemned by international law and, ironically, by India’s own Supreme Court. To destroy ancestral homes of families merely “perceived” to be connected to suspects is to rip apart the very fabric of community and dignity. This practice, mirrored in the mass evictions of thousands of Bengali-speaking Muslims in Assam and Gujarat under the stigmatizing guise of targeting “illegal infiltrators,” reveals a disturbing pattern of majoritarian discrimination masquerading as security policy.

Furthermore, the state’s actions seem designed to suffocate the truth itself. Shutting down communications, blocking thousands of social media accounts, and threatening journalists with detention under anti-terror laws are the tools of an authoritarian playbook, not a vibrant democracy. The discriminatory surveillance of Kashmiri students transforms universities into extensions of the security apparatus, chilling academic freedom and betraying the promise of India’s youth.

The forced displacement of nearly 1,900 Muslims, including vulnerable Rohingya refugees, to Bangladesh and Myanmar, without any due process, constitutes a flagrant violation of the fundamental international law principle of non-refoulement. This action risks returning persons to persecution and underscores a brutal disregard for human life when it is politically inconvenient.

This UN communication carries profound significance as a vital instrument of accountability. Amid official denials and a constrained domestic media, it establishes an authoritative record. It identifies laws such as the UAPA and PSA that facilitate these abuses and underscores their incompatibility with fundamental human rights norms. The report meticulously links specific state actions to violations of the ICCPR, the ICESCR, and customary international law.

The experts’ observations are not adversarial; they represent the fundamental demands of justice: disclose the lists of those detained, clarify the legal bases for demolitions, and investigate unlawful killings. They call for independent inquiries, accountability for perpetrators, and a security policy aligned with the principles of necessity, proportionality, and non-discrimination.The Indian government may be tempted to dismiss this as foreign interference, but doing so would be a serious mistake. This is not a matter of geopolitics; it is a matter of humanity. The experts rightly emphasize that counter-terrorism and human rights are mutually reinforcing. Brutal, discriminatory tactics do not eliminate extremism; instead, they deepen grievances and erode the trust essential for lasting security.

For the sake of its democratic soul and the well-being of all its citizens, India must heed this alarm. It must end collective punishment, halt unlawful demolitions, restore fundamental freedoms, and safeguard its most vulnerable. The credibility of India’s counter-terrorism efforts and its standing as a rights-respecting nation depend on it. The world has spoken with a clear and united voice. The question remains: will India listen?

Author is the chairman of Islamabad based think tank the Kashmir Institute of International Relations (KIIR). He can be reached via email: Saleeemwani@hotmail.com @sultan1913

 

Of Silence and Surveillance: The Erosion of Rights in  India occupied Jammu and Kashmir. 

By Altaf Hussain Wani

 

In the picturesque valleys and bustling towns of  occupied Jammu and Kashmir, a new normal is being meticulously constructed—one built not on the pillars of justice and liberty, but on the shifting sands of suspicion and the pervasive eye of surveillance. Recent reports of widespread detentions, the Criminalization of professions, and the arbitrary summoning of citizens paint a disturbing portrait of a region where the fundamental rights to expression, privacy, and due process are being systematically eroded under the guise of counter-terrorism.

 

The official narrative of Indian authorities in occupied territory is familiar and unwavering. Security forces, in “unwavering efforts to eradicate the remnants of terror networks,” conduct coordinated raids, detaining individuals under preventive measures based on “credible inputs.” As reported in Ganderbal and Sopore, these operations lead to the detention of dozens—39 persons in one instance—often described as “Over Ground Workers (OGWs)” or “associates of terrorist handlers.” Their homes are searched, digital devices seized, and they are lodged in jails without trial, their liberty sacrificed at the altar of public security.

 

However, a closer examination of these actions reveals a pattern that should alarm any advocate for democratic values. The term “credible inputs” remains shrouded in secrecy, devoid of public scrutiny or judicial oversight. This lack of transparency transforms preventive detention from a tool of last resort into a weapon of first instance, allowing for the indefinite incarceration of individuals based merely on suspicion. The arbitrary summoning of people to police stations for questioning further reinforces a climate of fear, where every citizen is a potential suspect and every interaction with authority carries an implicit threat.

 

Perhaps most alarming is the recent trend of criminalising entire professions, most notably the medical community. The case of doctors like Dr. Adeel and Dr. Muzzamil, accused of being part of a radicalized module, stretches credulity. The narrative, built on the flimsy foundation of a poster pasted in Srinagar, quickly unravels under scrutiny. The contradictions in official accounts are glaring: different media outlets report different names and quantities of recovered materials—350 kg of explosives becomes 2900 kg; AK-47 rifles are reported by one agency and denied by another. The Faridabad Police Commissioner’s statement contradicting the occupied Kashmir Police’s claims exposes a hastily constructed narrative, one that appears designed to generate headlines rather than uphold justice.

 

This targeting of professionals is not random. It sends a chilling message: even the most educated and integrated members of society are not safe from accusation. It serves to dismantle community trust, create societal paranoia, and dissuade the youth from aspiring to roles of influence and respect. When a doctor, a symbol of healing and trust, can be transformed into a terrorist suspect based on such dubious evidence, no one is safe. This appears less like law enforcement and more like a strategy to demoralise a population and dismantle its social fabric.

 

Underpinning this entire apparatus is a brutal assault on the right to privacy. The mandate forcing shopkeepers to install CCTV cameras at their own expense, with footage accessible to police without a court order, institutionalises a surveillance state. This move, justified under the same security pretext, ensures that every public and commercial space becomes a panopticon. The right to anonymity, to a private life free from constant government monitoring, is effectively abolished. This vast network of surveillance is not merely about solving crimes; it is about preempting dissent, monitoring political activity, and creating a permanent record of every citizen’s movements and associations.

 

Furthermore, reports of raids within jails to “harass already detained people” complete this grim picture. If even incarceration does not spare an individual from further intimidation, then the state’s power becomes truly absolute and terrifying. It signifies a move beyond punishing illegal acts to punishing the individual themselves, breaking their spirit long after they have been deprived of their liberty.

 

The statements of political leaders like Mehbooba Mufti, who speaks of Jammu and Kashmir being “locked in a cage,” are dismissed as political rhetoric. But they articulate a profound truth felt by all  residents of occupied Kashmir . It must be remembered that the only crime of the people of Indian occupied Kashmir is demanding the rights enshrined in UN Security Council resolutions. The abrogation of Article 370 was promised to bring development and integration. Instead, it has brought a perpetual state of exception where legal protections are suspended and the authority of the security apparatus is supreme.

 

A counter-terrorism strategy that operates without robust legal safeguards, that criminalises dissent and profession, and that places an entire population under constant surveillance is ultimately self-defeating. It may create a fragile, enforced silence, but it does not create lasting peace or security. True security is built on trust, justice, and the unwavering protection of fundamental rights. By sacrificing these principles, the state is not combating terrorism; it is risking the alienation of an entire generation and undermining the very democratic values it claims to protect.

 

As these lines are written, news breaks of a car blast at a metro station in New Delhi—a tragic event that will inevitably have repercussions far beyond the capital. History suggests the ultimate outcome of this news will be increased repression against Kashmiri Muslims both in India and occupied Kashmir, a familiar pattern of collective punishment that follows such incidents. The critical question now is whether the Indian government will immediately resort to its well-practiced blame game, pointing fingers across the border, or whether it will have the courage to investigate its own security failures and address the root causes of unrest. The cage being built around India occupied Jammu and Kashmir is not just physical; it is a cage for the mind and spirit, and its doors threaten to close tighter than ever. Only time will tell which path toward security India will choose—one of accountability and rights, or one of further repression and alienation.

 

Writer is Chairman Kashmir Institute of International Relations and can be reached at: saleeemwani@hotmail.com  and on X : @sultan1914

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