Statement of Bastar Solidarity Network (Kolkata Chapter) on Pulwama Blast and its aftermath

40 Indian soldiers were killed in a blast in Pulwama, Kashmir on February 14, a day on which most
‘Deshbhakts’ go about heckling couples in public places. Since then, there have been numerous
candlelight marches ‘in solidarity with the jawans’ organised by various political parties in different
parts of the country and in all likelihood, there will be a few more. Prime minister Narendra Modi
said in a speech after this incident, “the nation’s blood is boiling.”

In the aftermath of the attack, Kashmiris are being attacked by ‘Deshbhakts’ in different parts of the
country. In the few days since the Pulwama blast, a Kashmiri shawl vendor in West Bengal was
beaten bloody, two Kashmiri shawl vendors were beaten up on a train, an angry ‘Deshbhakt’ mob
gathered in front of a girls’ hostel in Dehradun causing the Kashmiri girls inside to lock themselves in
out of fear, a cell phone video has emerged of a Kashmiri man being beaten while the hecklers
screamed, ‘bol, Bharat mata ki jai bol!’, a Kashmiri doctor and his family was given death threats in
Kolkata, the photo of a sign in front of a shop in Dehradun that says “dogs are allowed but Kashmiris
not allowed” has gone viral, fake images of the blast are being circulated with the intent to whip up
the nationalistic fervor, one can go on.

‘Deshbhakts’ have, predictably, got to fanning the anti-Pakistan flames and in some places, this anti-
Pakistan sentiment has found official sanction. In Bikaner, a District Magistrate has ordered all
Pakistani nationals to leave Bikaner within 48 hours. The order also prohibits employing Pakistani
nationals, admitting them to hospitals, hotels or residence and maintaining any kind of trade
relations with them. There are, according to an activist quoted in an article on the Asian
Independent site, 25,000 Pakistani migrants in Rajasthan and a few hundred of them are in Bikaner.
All Indian Cine Workers Association has announced a blanket ban on hiring Pakistani actors and
artists in the film industry and threatened “strong action” against those who would violate this ban.
The Indian government has revoked the ‘Most Favoured Nation’(MFN) status given to Pakistan
according to the WTO treaty. As the MFN status implies reduced trade barriers and the trade ties
between the two countries are hardly strong, this is a symbolic move whose purpose seems to be to
add to the anti-Pakistan sentiments that the ‘Deshbhakts’ are peddling.

On social media, the army of ‘Deshbhakts’, many among whom have RSS-BJP connections, are
clamouring for war against Pakistan. They are trying to drown out any criticism of the Indian
government and the role of the army with their screams and abuses which they justify by calling it all
‘Deshbhakti’. A history teacher at a Delhi Public School was forced to resign because he had made a
facebook post saying that the deceased jawans cannot be called martyrs as they were there doing
their job. There are others who faced troubles at workplace for expressing opinions that deviated
from the rhetoric of ‘Deshbhakti’ championed by the ‘Deshbhakts’ which is one of communal and
nationalistic violence on Kashmiris, Pakistanis and Muslims.

But thankfully that is not the only picture. There have been vocal, active protests against spreading
this violent, communal, anti-Kashmiri version of ‘Deshprem’ too. In Nabadwip, when a group of
‘Deshbhakts’ showed up in front of a house to heckle the members of the household, they were
rounded up by local youths and handed over to the police. After the Kashmiri doctor in Kolkata
received death threats, many stood with the doctor against the hate-mongers, and as a result of
which the doctor has decided to stay in the city. Many citizens took the initiative to set up helplines
for Kashmiris in different parts of the country. Quite a few have offered to host Kashmiris in their
houses. In some cases, government officials too did their duty of providing protection to some
Kashmiris and other targets of such ‘Deshbhakti’ quite commendably. In some cases, employers of
people who have been targets of these ‘Deshbhakts’ stood with their employees. Many have
condemned the war cries from these ‘Deshbhakts’, including Mita Santra, the wife of jawan Bablu
Santra who died in Pulwama blast. All these instances give us hope for a better future where
communalism and religious fundamentalism will not be allowed to thrive.

We shall not provide an armchair analysis of the Pulwama blast as we do not know who were behind
it and why this attack happened. We would instead like to draw your attention to the life of a
Kashmiri in India-occupied Kashmir, which is one of the most militarized zones in the entire world. A
large section of the mainstream Indian media reported the killing of 22-year-old Burhan Wani
describing him as a terrorist and was horrified by the mourning of his death in Kashmir. The Indian
media largely left out the part where 15-year-old Burhan and his older brother Khalid were ordered
by some Indian police officers to bring cigarettes for them and when the two brothers returned, the
officers beat them up. Unable to bear the humiliation by the Indian armed forces, Burhan joined a
militant group. His brother Khalid, who was doing his post-graduation in economics, was also killed
by the Indian forces the year before Burhan was killed, as Basharat Peer reports.

Why did so many Kashmiris mourn Burhan’s death? Was it because, as Arnab Goswami and Co.
would have you believe, Kashmiris want to destroy the lives of Indians, or does the fact that the
humiliation that Burhan experienced at the hands of the Indian armed forces is part of a Kashmiri’s
everyday experience – something that Indian media knows full well but chooses not to focus on –
have something to do with it? Why did so many Kashmiris mourn Afzal Guru, who once became a
militant just like Burhan, and then later surrendered to the Border Security Forces(BSF) on his
family’s advice and was living his life until he was charged with plotting the attack on the Indian
Parliament in 2001 without sufficient evidence, and then was tortured in custody, given electric
shocks to his penis and other body parts, beaten up for hours and was threatened that his family
would be harmed if he did not confess, was led to believe that his brother was in custody when he
was not, then a confession was extracted from him without any legal representation for him, and
then was finally hanged in 2013, not on the basis of evidence, but to satisfy the “collective
conscience”?

Why didn’t India mourn Afzal?

Custodial torture, rapes, harassment are routine in Kashmir. In the 18 years of AFSPA 1990 (a near-
identical version of the Armed Forces Special Powers Act which is implemented in the North-East
which prevents prosecution of members of the armed forces unless the central government
sanctions the prosecution) in Kashmir, not a single member of the armed forced has been
prosecuted for crimes committed in Kashmir. One should at the very least remember at this point
the Kashmiri man who went to vote and was tied in front of a military jeep as a human shield by the
Indian army. Meanwhile we have seen numerous deaths of and assaults on protesting and non-
protesting Kashmiris by the Indian armed forces who are permitted to use lethal force on Kashmiris,
thanks to AFSPA. The use of pellet guns on protesters has left several, including little children, blind
and semi-blind.

How have the responses from Indians been to the daily torment of Kashmiris?

While the responses have been diverse and range from sincere concern for Kashmiri lives to extreme
apathy or even sheer cruelty, one would often hear the refrain ‘Kashmir is an integral part of India’
during discussions on Kashmir. There would be talks about the geopolitical importance of Kashmir,
how control over the Kargil line provides military advantages to India against Pakistan and so on, in
short, anything apart from how Kashmiris themselves would like to govern their lives and how their
lives actually are with such strong Indian military presence. This is the tongue of the colonizer to
whom the will of the people of the land is unimportant as long as the occupation benefits the
occupier. This is why these 40 jawans are mourned, but not the thousands of Kashmiris killed and
brutalized by the Indian army. Kashmiris did not get the plebiscite they were promised over half a
century ago when protests erupted over the decision of their king, Maharaja Hari Singh, of joining
the Indian Union. This Hari Singh, along with the RSS, abetted the 1947 Jammu massacre in which
over 20,000 Kashmiri Muslims were killed. This abetment was done with the intent to turn Muslims
into a minority community in the region. This was the king who decided the fate of Kashmiris at that
point of time, which many Kashmiris were not ready to accept. And now the BJP government is
talking about revoking the autonomies that Kashmir is granted under Article 370 and 2018 has been
the bloodiest year in the history of Kashmir since Indian independence.

We want a resolution of the Kashmir conflict that upholds the right to self-determination of
Kashmiris and the right of the displaced in the conflict, including Jammu Muslims and Kashmiri
Hindus, to return to their lands in peace. But the Indian government, be it a Congress one or a BJP
one, has demonstrated amply that this is not on their agenda. The Pakistani government too with
their gross violations of human rights in Pakistan-occupied Kashmir has proven their insincerity to
the cause of the Kashmiris. The RSS ‘Deshbhakts’ thrive on the deaths of Kashmiris and jawans, most
of whom come from poor families and join the army hoping for financial security for themselves and
their families as there are very few employment opportunities for them. Out of the 40 jawans who
died in the Pulwama blast, 35 were SC, ST, OBC and Muslim. The Hindutva-peddling RSS fuels its
detestable brand of ‘Deshbhakti’ on the sufferings of some of the most oppressed sections of the
society.

It is up to us all to gather our strength behind the cause for Kashmir, if we really believe that
colonialism must die in all parts of the world.