Sad Happenings in Kashmir

Over the past near three and a half months Kashmir has become synonym of sad news and pessimistic developments. One after another bad news has dawned the sphere of life in the browbeaten valley of Kashmir .Killing, injuries, continuous shutdowns, blindings have defined the life in Kashmir during this time.At least 92 civilians have been killed and over 13,000 injured in the last 104 days of the on-going civil uprising since July 9, a day after the killing of Hizbul Mujahideen militant Burhan Wani.Hundreds have been left blinded by the brutal use of pellet guns.

In another worrying development, The Jammu and Kashmir government has sacked over a dozen of its employees for their alleged involvement anti-India activities.“Reports on their anti-national activities prepared by the state police were forwarded to the Chief Secretary, who then directed respective heads of departments to issue orders terminating their services,” reports said.

cross Line of Control (LoC) firing  incidents have grown making innocents living on border pay a heavy price and incidents of violence have alsp grown in Kashmir.

In late 2015 and early 2016, observers of Kashmir reported growth in home-grown militancy and radicalisation of the Kashmiri population. Several reasons for this trend have been cited such as the absence of a political dialogue, the lack of economic opportunities, frustration due to high unemployment, excessive militarisation of the public space and repeated human rights violations by the security forces.

Globally noted organizations have expressed concern over the worsening of condition in Kashmir. Amnesty International accused Indian security forces were using “arbitrary and excessive force” to deal with the protests in Kashmir. It also stated that their actions were a violation of international standards and were leading to a worsening of the human rights crisis in the state. The organisation also criticized the use of pellet guns stating they had been used a 100 times in Kashmir during the first week of September 2016 even though its use was meant to be rare. It called for their ban stating they were dangerous and also expressed concern at the deployment of PAVA shells in the state as they could be used in an “arbitrary or indiscriminate manner”

Undoubtedly, sad developments have defined life in Kashmir since long.