Leading Indian newspaper, The Hindu, has reported that two days before the arrival of the Swedish Royal couple King Carl Gustaf and Queen Silvia, and senior Ministers, including Foreign Minister Anne Linde, Stockholm sent its strongest message on Jammu and Kashmir thus far, urging the government to lift all restrictions placed in the former State, and calling for it to “involve” Kashmiris for a resolution of the issue. The statement, made by Ms. Linde in the Swedish Riksdag or Parliament on November 26 in reply to a question, came ahead of a week-long visit (December 1-6) by the Swedish delegation, where the two sides were expected to announce an important polar research agreement, hold the first “innovation council” dialogue, discuss cooperation on defence, clean technologies, tackling air pollution, and trade. “We emphasise the importance of respect for human rights, that an escalation of the situation in Kashmir is avoided and that a long-term political solution to the situation must involve Kashmir’s inhabitants. Dialogue between India and Pakistan is crucial. Sweden and the EU (European Union) urge the Indian government to lift the remaining restrictions imposed on Jammu and Kashmir. It is crucial that free movement and communication opportunities are restored,” the statement by Ms. Linde in the Riksdag said.
The Swedish statement follows statements of concern by other visiting European leaders like German Chancellor Angela Merkel, and Finnish Foreign Minister Pekka Haavisto.
The statement calling the situation in Kashmir “worrying” follows a shorter statement made in the Swedish Parliament on September 13, and a Twitter statement issued by then Foreign Minister Margot Wallstrom on August 10, days after the Indian government’s move on Article 370 in Jammu and Kashmir. When asked about Sweden’s position, its Ambassador Klas Molin said that Stockholm was fully aligned with the European Union that has issued similar statements and held a special hearing on the situation in Kashmir in recent weeks. “The Kashmir issue is a long-standing one. We see it as emanating from a bilateral dispute and thus has to be resolved through dialogue between India and Pakistan. That is the EU’s position. The other main tenet is that Kashmiris should have a say in their own future,” Mr. Molin told The Hindu.
Dexter Filkins has reported for the New Yorker that Narendra Modi’s Hindu-nationalist government has cast two hundred million Muslims as internal enemies. Narendra Modi is also a hero of anti-Muslim bigots. On August 11th, two weeks after Prime Minister Narendra Modi sent soldiers in to pacify the Indian state of Kashmir, a reporter appeared on the news channel Republic TV, riding a motor scooter through the city of Srinagar. She was there to assure viewers that, whatever else they might be hearing, the situation was remarkably calm. “You can see banks here and commercial complexes,” the reporter, Sweta Srivastava, said, as she wound her way past local landmarks. “The situation makes you feel good, because the situation is returning to normal, and the locals are ready to live their lives normally again.” She conducted no interviews; there was no one on the streets to talk to.
Ever since Modi was first elected Prime Minister, in 2014, he has been recasting the story of India, from that of a secular democracy accommodating a uniquely diverse population to that of a Hindu nation that dominates its minorities, especially the country’s two hundred million Muslims. Modi and his allies have squeezed, bullied, and smothered the press into endorsing what they call the “New India.”
Kashmiris greeted Modi’s decision with protests, claiming that his real goal was to inundate the state with Hindu settlers. After the initial tumult subsided, though, the Times of India and other major newspapers began claiming that a majority of Kashmiris quietly supported Modi they were just too frightened of militants to say so aloud. Television reporters, newly arrived from Delhi, set up cameras on the picturesque shoreline of Dal Lake and dutifully repeated the government’s line.
According to FactChecker, an organization that tracks communal violence by surveying media reports, there have been almost three hundred hate crimes motivated by religion in the past decade almost all of them since Modi became Prime Minister. Hindu mobs have killed dozens of Muslim men. The murders, which are often instigated by Bajrang Dal members, have become known as “lynching’s”. The lynching’s take place against a backdrop of hysteria created by the RSS and its allies a paranoid narrative of a vast majority, nearly a billion strong, being victimized by a much smaller minority.
When Muslims are lynched, Modi typically says nothing, and, since he rarely holds press conferences, he is almost never asked about them. But his supporters often salute the killers. In June, 2017, a Muslim man named Alimuddin Ansari, who was accused of cow trafficking, was beaten to death in the village of Ramgarh. Eleven men, including a local leader of the BJP, were convicted of murder, but last July they were freed, pending appeal. On their release, eight of them were met by Jayant Sinha, the B.J.P. Minister for Civil Aviation. Sinha, a Harvard graduate and a former consultant for McKinsey & Company, draped the men in marigold garlands and presented them with sweets. “All I am doing is honouring the due process of law,” he said at the time. In northern India, Hindu nationalists have whipped up panic around the idea that Muslim men are engaging in a secret campaign to seduce Hindu women into marriage and prostitution. As with the hysteria over cow killings, the furor takes form mostly on social media and platforms like WhatsApp, where rumours spread indiscriminately. The idea known as “love jihad” is rooted in an image of the oversexed Muslim male, fortified by beef and preying on desirable Hindu women. In many areas, any Muslim man seen with a Hindu woman risks being attacked.
Indian consul general in United States, Sandeep Chakravorty, has called for adopting ‘Israeli model’ in Kashmir. “It has happened in the Middle East. If the Israeli people can do it, we can also do it”. Both India and Israel have been using the bogey of Islamic terror to justify their security policies. He told Kashmiri Hindus and Indian nationals that India will build settlements modelled after Israel for the return of the Hindu population to Kashmir. Chakravorty asked those present to give the government some time to implement its plans in the valley.
This mind set is reflective of the fascist mind-set of the Indian government’s RSS ideology that has continued the siege of IOJK since August 05. Return of Kashmiri Pandits is being instrumentalized to justify this model. His comments drew the ire of Pakistan’s Prime Minister Imran Khan who in a tweet on Wednesday said: “Shows the fascist mindset of the Indian govt’s RSS [Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh] ideology that has continued the siege of IOJK [Indian-occupied Jammu and Kashmir] for over 100 days.”
India is hoping against the hope that the security situation will improve, allowing voluntarily displaced Hindu Pundits to return to their abandoned homes shortly. Interestingly Hurriyat leadership has never opposed return of Hindu Pundits. Pro-freedom leaders in Kashmir have repeatedly called for the return of Kashmiri Pandits, but have urged them to return as neighbours and not settlers. This indeed is the outline of a settler-colonial policy for the valley, which is the ultimate ambitions of the Indian state. Kashmiri Pandits are being coaxed to return as settlers. There is an evolving anxiety among Kashmiri Pandits that their pain is being weaponised to further the goals of the BJP-led government. The BJP-led government has repeatedly promised the return of the Hindu minority who left Kashmir during the height of the insurgency against Indian rule in the early 1990s. Number is around 100,000 Kashmiri Hindus.
According to Anadolu News Agency, diplomat’s remarks have also evoked responses that are reflective of the positions various groups have on the return of Kashmiri Hindus. Sanjay Tickoo, chairman of the Kashmir Pandit Sangharsh Samiti, who did not migrate, said the idea of Israeli type settlements was “crazy”. “Do they think that with the abrogation of Article 370 they can do anything? We won’t allow such settlements”. Satish Mahaldar, a Kashmiri Pandit leader who migrated in 1990, said: “I condemn his remarks because they go against the very grain of our secular constitution. Miscreants are trying to divide us along communal lines. My Kashmir is not a place for such ideas.” Ashok Kaul, a ruling Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) representative in Kashmir, denied any plans of initiating Israel-style settlements. “We have always maintained that Kashmiri Pandits should return to their homeland with honour, dignity and with full security so that the previous (mass exodus) things should not happen again,” he said.
Both India and Israel have a track record of persecuting the innocent people fighting for their legitimate right to self-determination. Now one oppressor has made its intentions clear to emulate the high-handed and tyrannical tactics of the other oppressor to achieve its ulterior motives.
This really once again exposes the fascist face of Modi regime and that it has no regard whatsoever of the human rights. Out of desperation it is using all tactics to annex the land of Kashmiris in total contravention of international laws and UNSC resolutions. Israeli settlements are illegal under the international law as they violate the fourth Geneva Convention which prohibits an occupying power from transferring its population to the area it occupies. Israelis, just like the Indians, have proved time and again that they are above any international law. Indian attempt to imitate Israeli model in occupied Kashmir also holds no basis. Just like Palestinians, the Kashmiris are also fighting against the oppressive regime for decades and they have never surrendered. Hence, the Modi government should not live in any fool’s paradise that the Kashmiris will accept its despotic tactics. Any attempt to deprive the Kashmiris of their land will only further aggravate the situation. India should shun its negative course and talk to Pakistan and Kashmiris to find a durable solution reflecting aspirations of the Kashmiri people.
In an effort to recapture fast slipping away RSS narrative, roadshows are taking place in New York to promote a film on the experience of Kashmiri Pandits, which is being described as “India’s holocaust”. Theresa Matthew, a New York City-based activist with South Asia Solidarity Initiative (SASI), told MEE that though she was not surprised by the video, it was still “always breath-taking to witness the sheer peddling of lies by senior government officials. “The violent re-writing of the subcontinent’s history is angering, stunning and also tiring. It’s a familiar tactic that relies on nationalism, Brahmanism and Islamophobia. It has little to do with displaced Kashmiri Pandits,” Matthews told MEE. This attempt has attracted terse criticism from Kashmiri activists as right-wing propaganda. One such event at Rutgers University had to be moved to a temple in Edison after an outcry from students and academics. Some of such events are being organised jointly by the American Jewish Council and the Hindu Jewish Council. However, the World view on the situation in Indian occupied Jammu and Kashmir is different from Indian narrative.
Pakistan’s Foreign Office has welcomed the hearing of the Tom Lantos Human Rights Commission of the United States Congress on the situation in occupied Jammu and Kashmir. According to the statement, the deliberations of the commission reinforced internationally recognised disputed nature of the Jammu and Kashmir issue and highlighted gross human rights violations and the humanitarian crisis in occupied Jammu and Kashmir. “A call for an independent fact-finding mission to occupied Kashmir was made and the right of self-determination of Kashmiri people was also duly underscored during the Commission’s proceedings,” it added.
Pakistan recognises efforts of members of the US Congress who have raised their voices of conscience on the ongoing persecution of the people in occupied Kashmir and called upon the Indian government to end its brutal repression. People of Pakistan appreciate that the US leadership and lawmakers are cognisant of the potential threats to fundamental human rights, freedom of speech, right of self-determination, and peace and stability in the region and are willing to play their due role to help bring the continuing humanitarian nightmare to an end.
The general view during the hearing was that international journalists, independent human rights organisations and United Nations Special Rapporteurs should be allowed to visit occupied Kashmir. The witnesses also called for immediate lifting of the communications blockade and restoration of human rights in occupied Jammu and Kashmir. Overall, it was emphasised that India should not be allowed to continue its oppressive policies as well as religious and ethnic persecution.
Vice Chairman of Jammu and Kashmir Young Men’s League (JKYML), Zahid Ashraf has lashed out at the obnoxious and diabolical statement of a former Indian army General against Kashmiri women during a TV talk show. While referring to the highly provocative statement of Major General (Retd), S.P Sinha, Zahid said that the remarks were outrageously unconscionable and a slap in the face of the global conscience. S P Sinha during a talk show on an Indian channel, had called for rape and murder of Kashmiri women in occupied Kashmir. Zahid Ashraf said that the Statement testifies to the barbaric face of the occupation forces and their heinous tactics of repression to suppress the legitimate voice of freedom. Thousands of killings and gang rapes during the last three decades have amply exposed the murderous and inhuman face of the occupying power, India.
Recently, Kashmiri and German human rights activists have called upon the world not to ignore the abuses committed by the India forces in occupied Kashmir. Rights leaders Karl-Christian Hausmann of UPF, Patricia associated with a German human rights organisation, Dr. Ishaq and Zafar Qureshi from London and Kashmir Council EU Chairman, Ali Raza Syed recently addressed a conference titled, “The Alarming Humanitarian Crisis in Kashmir” on occasion of UN International Day for Tolerance in the city of Stuttgart. Hausmann said, “It is surprising what I heard about the situation in Jammu and Kashmir. The German media doesn’t cover Kashmir as much as it should.” After listening to the Kashmiri Diaspora, Patricia promised they will do their utmost to make people aware of wrong doing in Kashmir.
Moreover, Kashmir Council EU held its 12th Kashmir EU Week at the European Parliament in the first week of November. The main theme was “Human Rights and Civil Liberties” including the rights of the Kashmiri civilian population protected be series of International Treaties and Conventions. Conference expressed grave concerns over arbitrary arrests, mass rapes, unmarked mass graves, impunity to armed forces. Another such vocal supporter
Another such vocal supporter is George Galloway, a straight-talking British politician. Galloway, who was in Karachi to attend a seminar on human rights abuses in the occupied territory, believes nations around the world will eventually reconfigure their ties with India. “They are not moving towards Modi’s India out of love but out of interest. And when a nation loses love, it loses soft power in the world,” he warned.
Modi’s unilateral decision to revoke Kashmir’s limited autonomy, and the blatant violation of human rights has tarnished his reputation in the world, and by extension India’s. The treatment of religious minorities as a whole, the Sikhs, Christians and national minorities within India, and the shocking footage that frequently emerges on social media of people being lynched by RSS militants has exposed Modi.
Pakistan’s permanent Representative to the United Nations (UN), Munir Akram has urged that the international community must play its role to resolve the Kashmir dispute. India’s inhuman curfew and blanket restrictions on all forms of communications as well as systematic intimidation, normalcy has still not returned and fear grips the disputed state.
