Jammu and Kashmir:

A Human Rights Agenda for an Elected

Administration

Release date: August 5, 2024

THE FORUM FOR HUMAN RIGHTS

IN JAMMU AND KASHMIR
 TABLE OF CONTENTS

Acknowledgements ii
Report and Methodology iii
Members of the Forum iv
Executive Summary v
Recommendations 1
Elections 7
Civilian Security 17
Economic and Human Development 41
List of Rights that Continue to be Violated 47
Appendix: About the Forum 54

i
 ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

The Forum for Human Rights would like to thank Research Assistant Arjun
Reddy for his work on this report, and Design Assistant Sushila Sahay for
the report’s cover and layout. Special thanks also to former Research
Associate Abhishek Babbar for his legal inputs to the report.

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 THE REPORT AND ITS METHODOLOGY
The Forum for Human Rights in Jammu and Kashmir comprises an informal
group of concerned citizens who believe that, in the prevailing situation in
the former state, an independent initiative is required so that continuing
human rights violations do not go unnoticed.

This is the fourth annual report issued by the Forum, which has also issued
two mid-term and/or thematic reports). It has largely been compiled from
government sources, media accounts (carried in well-established and
reputed newspapers or television), NGO fact-finding reports, interviews, and
information garnered through legal petitions. The various sources listed
above have been fact-checked against each other to ensure the information
is as accurate as possible, and only that information has been carried that
appears to be well-founded. Where there is any doubt regarding a piece of
information, queries have been footnoted.
[email protected]

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 MEMBERS OF THE FORUM
Co-Chairs:
Gopal Pillai, former Home Secretary, Government of India
Radha Kumar, former member, Group of Interlocutors for Jammu and
Kashmir

Members:
Justice Ruma Pal, former judge of the Supreme Court of India
Justice AP Shah, former Chief Justice of the Madras and Delhi High Courts
Justice Bilal Nazki, former Chief Justice of the Orissa High Court
Justice Hasnain Masoodi, former judge of the Jammu and Kashmir High
Court
Justice Anjana Prakash, former judge of the Patna High Court
Nirupama Rao, former Foreign Secretary, Government of India
Probir Sen, former Secretary-General, National Human Rights
Commission
Amitabha Pande, former Secretary, Inter-State Council, Government of
India
Moosa Raza, former Chief Secretary, Government of Jammu and Kashmir
Shantha Sinha, former chairperson, National Commission for the
Protection of Child Rights
Major-General Ashok Mehta (retd)
Air Vice-Marshal Kapil Kak (retd)
Lieutenant-General H S Panag (retd)
Colonel Yoginder Kandhari (retd)
Enakshi Ganguly, Co-founder and former Co-director, HAQ Centre for
Child Rights
Ramachandra Guha, writer and historian
Anand Sahay, columnist
Shivani Sanghavi, lawyer

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EXECUTIVE SUMMARY

EXECUTIVE SUMMARY

In December 2023, the Supreme Court of India ordered the Union of India
and the Jammu and Kashmir administration to hold legislative elections by
end-September 2024. Assuming that neither the administration nor the
Election Commission request postponement, this fifth annual report of the
Forum for Human Rights in Jammu and Kashmir lays out a human rights
agenda for the newly elected administration and legislators, in the hope that
the issue attracts priority attention.

Jammu and Kashmir’s last elected administration fell in 2018. Between

August 5-9, 2019, the President of India and Indian parliament removed
Jammu and Kashmir’s special status under Article 370 of the Indian
constitution and divided and demoted the state to two Union Territories. The
Jammu and Kashmir Reorganization Act of 2019 quashed the state’s own
constitution and replaced almost all the state laws with national civil and
criminal law. It retained the state’s Public Safety Act, however, which allowed
the administration much larger powers of preventive detention than existed
under the Indian Penal and Criminal Procedure Codes. The latter two have
subsequently been replaced by the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita which, along
with the Bharatiya Nagarik Suraksha Sanhita (BNSS) and Bharatiya Sakshya
Adhiniyam (BSA), substantially expand both the powers of preventive
detention and of the police to arrest on suspicion.

As a consequence of the unliteral 2019 actions, Jammu and Kashmir’s

oversight commissions were closed down. These included the Human Rights
Commission, the Women’s Commission, the Accountability Commission and
the Information Commission. Independent human rights advocates were
arrested, and their reports on the state of human rights in Jammu and
Kashmir ceased to be published.

It was in this context that the Forum was founded, to fill a glaring gap in
human rights reporting. Anticipating that there will soon be an elected
administration and legislature – though there is a danger that rising armed
attacks in parts of the Jammu province might be cited to delay the legislative
assembly election – we expect that local institutions and civil society will be
able to resume monitoring, seek accountability and redress initiatives, and
this Forum will disband.

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 EXECUTIVE SUMMARY
The first step is clearly to hold a free and fair legislative election, and to do so
within the Supreme Court’s deadline. This is the first election to be held
under the new 2022 delimitation, which was widely criticized for its
imbalance. Despite this and other limitations, the people of Jammu and
Kashmir deeply desire restoration of their political right to representation,
as their large turnout in the April-May 2024 parliamentary election showed.
We urge the Election Commission, political parties and the Union
administration to work together to ensure such an outcome.

The findings of this report are as follows:

1. Election concerns. Delay in the announcement of election dates

has given rise to speculation that the legislative assembly might be
postponed beyond the Supreme Court’s deadline of September 30,
2024, possibly on grounds of rising militant attacks. Analysts point
out that delay would be counterproductive. It will increase alienation
and might play into the hands of spoilers.

2. Dismay over the pre-election grant of overweening powers

to the lieutenant-governor. There are worrying indications of
pre-emptive actions to limit an elected administration’s capacity to
govern even before legislative assembly elections are held. The new
administrative rules issued on July 12, 2024, allocate key powers over
the police, bureaucracy, attorney-general and prosecutorial services
to the lieutenant-governor, setting up a potential standoff between the
elected administration on one side, and a nominated authority, civil
and police services on the other, as happened in Delhi.

3. Demand for restoration of statehood. The new rules also cast

doubt on whether statehood will be restored, when and in which form.
Will they apply only as long as Jammu and Kashmir is a Union
Territory or will they apply also when statehood is restored as
promised? Up until now, it was assumed that restoration of statehood
meant restoration of full statehood. The new rules suggest the Union
administration is contemplating a Delhi-type hybrid instead.

4. Insecurity persists. Targeted attacks on Pandits and migrant

workers – both Hindu and Muslim – continue. The number of civilian

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EXECUTIVE SUMMARY

lives lost due to armed attacks and counter-insurgency operations is

much the same as in the previous year (20 between August 1, 2023-
July 20, 2024). The number of security forces casualties, including
police and Central Reserve Police Forces (CRPF), continue to be
unacceptably high (33 between August 1, 2023-July 20, 2024). As a
result of growing militancy in Jammu, village defence guards (VDCs)
have also been targeted.

5. Spread of militancy in Jammu and south Kashmir. After

decades of peace, the bordering areas of Poonch and Rajouri districts
in Jammu division re-emerged as a locus for militancy with cross-
border infiltration from Pakistani-held territories of the former state
in 2022-2023. Armed attacks on civilians and security forces have
now spread through Poonch-Rajouri to Doda and Kathua and further,
to bordering districts of south Kashmir such as Pulwama. The forest
belts connecting these districts have been traditional routes of
infiltration since the 1948 invasion by Pakistani tribals supported by
the Pakistan army.

6. Continuing civil rights abuses. There has been little

improvement in gross violations of the freedom of expression and
movement, especially the rights of the media to a safe working
environment. Arrests of students, journalists, lawyers and even a
businessman under draconian legislation such as the Unlawful
Activities (Prevention) Act (UAPA) and the Public Safety Act (PSA)
continue, despite judicial attempts to limit their application.
According to news reports citing official sources, over 2,700 people
were booked under the UAPA and PSA between 2020 and December
2023, 1,100 of them as ‘overground workers’ or facilitators of armed
insurgents.

One ray of hope is rising trend of judges quashing arrests and/or

granting bail in 2023-2024, a far higher number than in the previous
four years.

7. Custodial deaths and torture. Perhaps the most grievous

incident of torture and custodial deaths by troops since the decline of
insurgency in the early 2000s occurred in December 2023. After four
Indian soldiers were killed and three others wounded in a terror

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 EXECUTIVE SUMMARY
attack, soldiers of the 48 Rashtriya Rifles took 25 men into custody for
questioning from five villages in Rajouri and Poonch. The men were
allegedly tortured at three different army bases: Mastandra army post,
Dera Ki Gali and Bafliaz. The army’s enquiry accepts that there was
torture and three men died in custody.

8. Crimes against Scheduled Castes and Tribes. Incidents of

crimes against Scheduled Castes have increased from 0.20 (per
100,000) in 2020-2021 to 1.20 in 2023-2024; in the same period,
crimes against Scheduled Tribes have gone from 0 per 100,000 to
0.10.

9. Crimes against women and children. Police data for crimes

against women and children is only available up to 2022. It shows that
the former have decreased slightly from 3,937 in 2021 to 3,716 in
2022, while the latter have increased sharply, from 470 in 2019 to 920
in 2022.

10. The economy. According to the Economic Survey 2023-2024,

Jammu and Kashmir’s economy is yet to recover to its state pre-2019.
Between April 2015-March 2019, the state’s net domestic product
(NSDP) grew at an average of 13.28 percent (including Ladakh); after
it became a Union Territory (excluding Ladakh), the NSDP growth
rate averaged to 8.73 percent. Similarly, the per capita NSDP growth
rate was 12.31 percent between April 2015-March 2019; it was 8.41
percent between April 2019-March 2024. Even discounting the loss
years of 2016-2017 (intense stone-pelting agitations), 2019-2020
(lockdown to prevent protest against the removal of special status and
the Reorganization Act), and 2020-2021 (Covid-19 lockdowns), the
pre-2019 NSDP and per capita NSDP growth rates were better than
post-2019, the former at 15.61 per cent against 13.79 percent, and the
latter at 14.63 percent against 12.97 percent.

11. Unemployment and drug abuse. At 10.7 percent for April 2023-
March 2024, unemployment for all ages is 4 percentage points higher
than the all-India average of 6.6 percent; youth unemployment is as
high as 18.3 percent. The Forum’s 2023 report had pointed out that
unemployment and drug abuse were closely related in Jammu and
Kashmir, as they are in Punjab. According to the union ministry of

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EXECUTIVE SUMMARY

health, Jammu and Kashmir is among the top two states and union
territories for drug abuse, with an estimated 900,000 habitual drug
users, roughly 1 in 130.

12. Impact of duty cuts on local industry. The Union Finance

Ministry’s 20 percent cut in import duties on walnuts and apples has
led to lower-priced walnuts being imported from China, Turkey and
the United States (U.S.), further impacting Kashmiri walnut farmers,
whose prices are higher due to the cost of labour and lack of irrigation
facilities. Similarly, the ministry’s slashing of the import duty on
Washington apples from 70 to 50 per cent has constituted a further
setback for apple growers. Kashmiri saffron has also suffered due to
the tax-free import of Iranian saffron, leading to a large reduction in
Kashmiri saffron production.

13. Land acquisition. Land acquisition policies continue to be

implemented high-handedly; this time the issue is of acquisition for
an all-weather railway line to Pahalgam for the Amarnath pilgrimage.

14. Human development deficits. According to the UNDP-NITI

Aayog’s 2023-2024 report on India’s performance on the Sustainable
Development Goals (SDGs), Jammu and Kashmir now scores at 74,
slightly above the all-India score of 71. The report has, however, been
widely criticised for both its methodology and its data sources. For
example, it gives Jammu and Kashmir 81 on SDG-16 – peace, justice
and strong institutions – for 2023-2024, up from 69 in the base year
of 2018. But it has chosen only the first of four indicators listed to
measure progress – murders per 100,000 of the population – while
omitting data on the number of conflict-related deaths or the
proportion of people who feel safe walking around.

The data used has also changed from report to report. On sex ratios
the data source used in 2019-2020 and 2020-2021 was the Ministry
of Home Affairs’ (Office of the Registrar General of India) Sample
Registration System, but in 2023-2024 it was the Ministry of Health
and Family Welfare’s National Family Health Survey. The result is
that the reports suggest an increase in the sex ratio from 917 in 2019-
2020 to 976 in 2023-2024, which appears to be statistically
impossible without a large influx of women immigrants.

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 EXECUTIVE SUMMARY
15. Leaving criticism aside, the index shows little improvement on key
goals such as SDG-1 (no poverty), which was awarded 61 on 100 in
2018, fell to 58 in 2019-2020 and rose to 64 in 2023-2024. Gender
equality (SDG-5) surprisingly jumped from 33 in 2018 to 53 in 2019-
2020 – was there more equality under the lockdown? – and remained
at that relatively low level in 2023-2024. Environmental protections,
including forest cover, fell from 74 in 2018 to 61 in 2023-2024. Quality
education, which was a low 51 in 2018, was a low 55 in 2023-2024.

16. Similarly, while child mortality rates (under five, per 1000 live births)
dropped from 38 to 17 between 2019-2024, the proportion of
pregnant women who are anaemic rose from 38.1 percent to 44.1
percent. The literacy rate (>15 years) fell from 76.4 percent in 2020 to
74.4 percent in 2023-24. On the plus side, the average annual dropout
rate at the secondary level (Class IX and X) has also declined from
17.81 per cent to 6 per cent over the same period.

17. Suicide and depression. It is estimated that 55.72 per cent of the
Jammu and Kashmir population suffer from depression, with the
highest numbers being young people between the ages of 15-35. In
rural areas, female depression rates were estimated to be around
93.10 percent as compared to males at 6.8 percent. Suicide rates have
gone up from 2.10 per 100,000 in 2020 to 2.40 in 2023-2024.

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RECOMMENDATIONS

RECOMMENDATIONS

A. Elections
1. Hold the legislative assembly election by the Supreme Court’s
deadline of September 30, as sought by the political leaders and
people of Jammu and Kashmir; former army commanders who
have served in the valley also argue that security should not be a
consideration given that elections have been held in far worse
security situations. Announce the election immediately. There is
no reason to wait until the election commission’s final voter list on
August 20.

2. Ensure a level playing field for all candidates. Security is a serious

concern for contesting candidates – both its provision and its
misuse. During the panchayat elections, opposition candidates
complained that they had far less access to security than BJP
candidates; at the same time, the administration warned against
campaigning without security.

3. Provide equal access for opposition parties to state-controlled

digital and electronic resources for campaigning. This might
require election commission monitoring.

4. Given apprehension of the poll’s integrity, the election commission

might consider inviting independent election monitors. This is a
proposal that the Jammu and Kashmir political parties could
make.

5. The new rules on division of powers must be rolled back. They

contravene the Supreme Court’s judgement in the Delhi case, and
they obstruct an elected administration’s ability to fulfil its duties
to the people, as intended by the Indian constitution. . Whether
they can be issued by a simple statute instead of constitutional
amendment is questionable.

6. Provide a timeline on restoration of statehood, as political leaders

have requested. Alongside, it should be clarified that this will be

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 RECOMMENDATIONS
full statehood, not the envisaged hybrid. If Article 3 does not
permit demotion to a Union Territory, it is unlikely to permit
demotion to a hybrid Union Territory-state.

7. Restore the executive authority of the elected Kargil and Leh hill
councils. Discuss statehood with concerned stakeholders,
including in Jammu and Kashmir. Accept and implement the
tribal welfare ministry’s recommendation that Ladakh be included
in the sixth schedule.

B. Civilian security
1. Act on the larger message conveyed by recent High Court and
Supreme Court rulings to prevent the misuse of the UAPA and PSA
to suppress dissent and/or information in Jammu and Kashmir.
Patterns of misuse have drawn increasing criticism from the
Jammu and Kashmir High Court and the Supreme Court. An
administrative order mandating strict restrictions on the offences
for which arrests under security-related legislation are permitted
and compensation for wrongful arrests might act as a deterrent.

2. Initiate criminal and civil actions against police, armed forces and
paramilitary forces found guilty of torture, custodial death or other
violations of human rights. Release action-taken reports on the
December 2023 torture of 25 men from Poonch-Rajouri and
custodial killing of three, the December 2020 Hokersar deaths, the
July 2020 extra-judicial killing of three Rajouri youth in Shopian,
and the alleged custodial death of Irfan Ahmed Dar of Sopore, and
the status of subsequent prosecutions.

3. Ensure that the army’s additional directorate for human rights is

given full freedom in investigating alleged human rights abuses
and monitoring adherence to the legal guidelines to be followed in
investigation and/or interrogation, and the humanitarian
guidelines to be followed when conducting cordon and search
operations (CASO).

4. Release all remaining political detainees who were taken into

preventive detention on or after August 4, 2019. Strictly
implement the rights to bail and speedy trial as underlined by the
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RECOMMENDATIONS

Supreme Court, including of newly elected MP Sheikh Abdul

Rashid, who has been in prison since 2019. Repeal the PSA and
other preventive detention legislation or amend them to bring
them in line with our constitutional ethos. Strictly implement
juvenile protection legislation in letter and spirit. Withdraw
unsubstantiated charges under the PSA/UAPA against students,
lawyers, political leaders, journalists and activists.

5. Respect the right of families to perform last rites and act

expeditiously for the return of Harsh Nagotra’s body from
Pakistan.

6. Reconsider the establishment of village defence guards and the

reinstatement of special police officers. In each case, these
initiatives have been found to increase the vulnerability of
employees as well as the public to acts of violence.

7. Once an elected administration is in place, establish a

coordination mechanism between the chief minister and
lieutenant-governor’s offices, security forces and police, headed by
the chief minister, to ensure overall improvement in security. Such
a mechanism existed during the chef ministerships of Mufti
Sayeed and Omar Abdullah, the peace process years when
insurgency related casualties fell from over 4,000 to below 200,
and civilian casualties fell to below 30.

8. Similarly, once the assembly election is concluded, establish a

human rights cell in the elected administration and set up a
human rights committee in the legislative assembly.

9. Ensure that community leaders are involved in facilitating the

return of Kashmiri Pandits, noting that Mirwaiz Umar Farooq has
recently appealed for their return. Without local support,
returnees will not be safe, and their reintegration will prove
extremely difficult.

10. Establish a safe environment for the media. Rollback the new
media policy, including police checks and/or raids on media

3
 outlets. Review the empanelment policy to ensure media outlets
are not punished for dissent.

RECOMMENDATIONS
11. Investigate allegations of the use of Pegasus spyware against
political leaders and others and rescind any orders that might have
been given for its use.

12. Recent analyses suggest that troops engaged in counter-

insurgency operations might not have the sophisticated
equipment that militant groups appear to have, such as night
vision scopes. Troops’ protection through adequate equipment is
also a human right.1

13. If militants have been found with U.S. made M4 carbines and
night vision scopes presumed to have been left behind in
Afghanistan, along with Pakistan-made medicines, this is an issue
to take up with both the U.S. and Pakistani administrations and
the UN’s Financial Action Task Force (FATF).

C. Oversight commissions – human rights, women, children,

information
1. Reconstitute the Jammu and Kashmir human rights, women’s and
information commissions and constitute a child rights
commission. The national commissions have not acted as
substitutes for the state commissions. The National Human Rights
Commission has not taken notice of the custodial torture and
deaths in December 2023 or sought stringent action. Nor has it
enquired into the use of the UAPA and PSA against journalists,
lawyers, students and other members of civil society.

The National Women’s Commission has outsourced its duties in

Jammu and Kashmir to TISS; moreover, it’s members do not
appear to recognize that stationing social workers in police cells,
while a good on its own, is no substitute for an office manned by
women’s rights advocates: the former is alienating, the latter
should be reassuring.

1Alok Asthana, ‘Who is Responsible for Militants’ Success in Jammu, Kashmir and
Ladakh’, The Wire, July 17, 2024.
4
RECOMMENDATIONS

D. Economic and human development

1. Free the state’s economy from restrictive controls and prioritize
support for locally owned companies, especially medium and
small enterprises as well as those involved in agriculture, tourism
and environmental protection or regeneration. Review import
duties that impact negatively on agricultural produce.

2. Conduct an urgent review of the policies that have led to a sharp

fall in Jammu and Kashmir’s forest cover under the lieutenant-
governor’s administration according to the Economic Survey
2024.

3. Given the lack of industrial development in Jammu and Kashmir,

it is difficult to see how the Union administration’s policy to tackle
youth unemployment through partly subsidised internships in
well-established companies will be implemented in the former
state. Seek expert advice on alternative routes to create
employment.

4. Adequately compensate innocent citizens whose houses have been

destroyed in CASO, eviction or land reclamation drives. Ensure
that nomadic tribes are extended the rights that they are entitled
to under the Forest Rights Act of 2006.

5. Ensure a transparent land acquisition and allotment process.

6. Investigate the causes of the sharp rise in anaemia amongst

women and provide them the nutrition required.

7. Identify the root causes of high rates oof depression and attempted
suicide and adopt measures to eliminate them. Expand
employment of local social workers, counsellors and psychiatrists.

8. Increase support for de-addiction centres.

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 ELECTIONS
ELECTIONS

The 2024 legislative assembly election will be one of the most important in
Jammu and Kashmir’s history. The former state has not had an elected
administration since the Mehbooba Mufti-headed Bharatiya Janata Party
(BJP)-Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) coalition was forced to resign in June
2018 following the BJP’s exit. In five years of lieutenant-governor’s rule
(2019-2024), far-reaching decisions on the civil, economic and political
rights of Jammu and Kashmir’s people have been taken without
consultation. Many will come up for review by a newly elected administration
and legislature. The stakes, therefore, are high.

In these circumstances, the need for a free and fair election is vital. Yet there
are already worrying indications. The 2022 delimitation weighted Jammu
and Kashmir voters unequally; it gerrymandered to create new Hindu-
majority constituencies in Jammu. As discussed in greater detail below, fresh
rules on the distribution of powers between an elected chief minister and the
lieutenant-governor render the former hamstrung by severely limited
authority. Whether the election will be followed by restoration of statehood
and what that statehood will comprise is now unclear.

It is not even clear whether the election will be held before the Supreme
Court’s deadline of September 30 expires. Despite assurances by Prime
Minister Modi and Home Minister Shah, the dates for the election may only
be announced after August 20, the election commission’s cut-off for
completion of the voters list (this will be the fourth revision of the voters list
since 2022). Since election dates are normally announced a month before the
election’s commencement, an announcement after August 20 will bring
polling dates dangerously close to the Supreme Court’s deadline.

There is also apprehension that the election might be postponed due to a rise
in armed attacks in parts of Jammu and Kashmir. Such a step would be
highly unusual, however. Elections have been held in far more conflictual
situations in Jammu and Kashmir earlier; Union administrations have
traditionally taken the position that they will not allow terrorists to derail
democratic processes. Notably too, the rise in cross-border infiltration and
attacks on security forces in the Poonch-Rajouri region did not negatively

6
ELECTIONS

impact the Lok Sabha election’s conduct or turnout in the Anantnag-Rajouri

constituency.

Finally, there were complaints during the recent Lok Sabha election and
earlier during the panchayat or local council elections, that candidates did
not have a level playing field. Here too, there is little assurance that the same
mistakes will not be repeated.

Arguments against poll postponement

In the face of apprehensions that the legislative assembly polls might be
postponed due to a rise in militant attacks, it is worth noting that the Lok
Sabha polls in Jammu and Kashmir were not postponed even though attacks
were ongoing.

The deep hunger of the people of Jammu and Kashmir for an elected
administration was demonstrated by their turnout for the Lok Sabha
elections. At 58.46 percent, it was the highest turnout in 35 years2, leading
the chief election commissioner to a hopeful prognosis for the legislative
assembly election.3 Constituency-wise voter turnouts in Jammu and
Kashmir’s five Lok Sabha seats were as follows: Jammu 72.22 percent,
Udhampur 68.27 percent, Baramulla 58.17 percent, Anantnag-Rajouri 54.84
percent and Srinagar 37.53 percent.4

The BJP won the Jammu and Udhampur seats and the National Conference
won the Srinagar and Anantnag-Rajouri seats. The Baramulla seat was won
by the imprisoned head of the Awami Ittehad Party, Abdul Rashid Sheikh
(popularly known as Engineer Rashid). Rashid was arrested in 2019 under
the UAPA and has been imprisoned ever since.5 Although elected, he was not
given bail to take his oath of office till July 1, 2024, when the NIA replied to

2Gulam Jeelani, ‘Lok Sabha Elections 2024: J-K records highest voter turnout in 35 years,
says Election Commission’, Livemint.com, May 27, 2024.
3PTI, ‘J&K records highest voter turnout in 35 years; CEC indicates Assembly polls to be
held soon’, The Hindu, May 27, 2024.
4 The Wire Analysis, ‘As J&K’s First Election Since Article 370 Move Ends, Concerns Over
Fairness and the Future’, The Wire, May 26, 2024; PTI, ‘J&K records highest voter turnout
in 35 years; CEC indicates Assembly polls to be held soon’, The Hindu, May 28, 2024.
5Iftikhar Gilani, ‘Engineer Rashid’s defiant victory a turning point for Kashmir’s
democratic future’, Frontline, June 22, 2024; Irfan Amin Malik, ‘Kashmir’s revolt at the
ballot box’, Frontline, June 8, 2024.

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 ELECTIONS
his petition, finally allowing him to take oath on July 5, 2024.6 The extent to
which he will be able to participate in parliamentary debates is limited; the
onus will be on his four colleagues to present his submissions.

In the run up to the Lok Sabha polls, there were two targeted attacks in the
Anantnag-Rajouri constituency, on a Delhi tourist driver on April 8 and on a
Bihari migrant worker on April 17. 7 At the same time but not in response to
the attacks, the election commission postponed the Anantnag-Rajouri poll
from May 7 to May 25, reportedly at the request of the BJP, the Jammu and
Kashmir Apni Party, the People’s Conference and the Democratic
Progressive Azad Party (DPAP), who alleged that ‘due to inclement weather
the road connectivity has been disrupted in the region and so we requested
the ECI to delay the polls.’8 On May 18, a week before the poll was held, two
further militant attacks in the constituency killed a BJP sarpanch (head of
an elected village council) and a tourist couple from Rajasthan. The poll was
not postponed again.9

The Anantnag-Rajouri Lok Sabha constituency was created by the

controversial 2022 delimitation of Jammu and Kashmir. 10 It almost doubled
voter numbers in the former Anantnag constituency, from around 1.09
million to 1.83 million, adding Gujjar and Pahari Muslims to Kashmiri
Muslims. And it removed 740,000 Muslim voters from the Jammu Lok
Sabha constituency. To place the impact of this change in context, the BJP’s
Jugal Kishore won Jammu with a margin of 135,498 votes: would he have
won had the pre-2022 delimitation been in force?

6 PTI, ‘Lodged in jail, Engineer Rashid forced to sit out oath ceremony of 18 th Lok Sabha’,
Deccan Herald, June 24, 2024; Nirbhay Thakur, ‘NIA gives consent to jailed Kashmiri
leader Engineer Rashid to take oath as MP’, The Indian Express, July 1, 2024.
7The Wire Staff, ‘J&K: Civilian Shot Dead in Anantnag; Second Targeted Attack in a Week
as Polls Near’, The Wire, April 18, 2024.
8 Irfan Amin Malik, ‘Why deferment of Lok Sabha election in Anantnag-Rajouri has
triggered controversy’, Frontline, May 4, 2024.
9The Wire Staff, ‘Two Militant Attacks Rock South Kashmir Ahead of Anantnag-Rajouri
Polls’, The Wire, May 19, 2024.
10The Forum for Human Rights in Jammu and Kashmir, Five Years Without an Elected
Administration: Human Rights in Jammu and Kashmir, August 2022 – July 2023, pp.
34-35.

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ELECTIONS

Pre-emptive measures: the 2022 delimitation

Beginning soon after the 2019 clampdown, a series of pre-emptive measures
have been put in place to shape a future legislative assembly and impact the
powers of an elected administration. Described in the Forum’s mid-term
report for August 2020 to January 2021, these range from encouraging
defections and/or breaking up existing regional parties to putting the
assembly election on indefinite hold while asserting that new leadership
would rise from local councils to a controversial fresh delimitation of
constituencies in 2022.11

The 2024 election will be the first one held under the 2022 delimitation,
whose flaws were discussed in detail in the Forum’s 2022 and 2023 reports.
It added seven new seats to the assembly, giving six to Jammu and only one
to the valley. With 56.15 percent of the erstwhile state’s population, the valley
was allocated 47 seats and Jammu was allocated 43 seats with 43.85 percent
of the population. In so doing, the delimitation derogated from the
fundamental democratic principle of voter equality, assigning different
values to different regional and/or religiously defined voters. Former state
finance minister Haseeb Drabu characterized the commission’s award as
weighting the Kashmiri vote at 0.8 to Jammu’s 1.12

Second, the rearrangement of political constituencies concentrated minority

voters in fewer districts or spread them across multiple districts, weakening
their vote share. New Hindu-majority constituencies were created in Jammu
while reducing the number of Muslim-majority constituencies. Former chief
minister Mehbooba Mufti called it a ‘tactical process of rigging before the
elections.’13

Despite these concerns, the Supreme Court dismissed a constitutional

challenge to the delimitation exercise on February 13, 202314, holding that

11The Forum for Human Rights in Jammu and Kashmir, Mid-Term Report: August 2020
to January 2021, 1, 12-19.
Haseeb A. Drabu, ‘Delimitation Commission Fails People Of J&K, Hurts Democracy’,
12

The Indian Express, May 7, 2022.

Express Web Desk, ‘”We have rejected delimitation commission, verdict doesn’t matter”’:
13

PDP’s Mehbooba Mufti’, The Indian Express, February 13, 2023.

14 Haji Abdul v. Union of India 2023 SCC Online SC 138.

9
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there was no illegality in the establishment of the commission, nor was there
any illegality with regards to the delimitation exercise undertaken by it.15

Changes to voter eligibility

Following delimitation, the electoral rolls have been revised thrice.16 A
special summary revision in May 2023 resulted in the addition of 0.77
million new voters (net figures, after accounting for deletion of 400,000
voters17) to the existing pool of 7.67 million voters, bringing the total to 8.44
million.18 In January 2024, further revision raised the number to 8.93
million.19

The increase was partly due to the fact that Article 35A of the Indian
constitution and article 140 of the Jammu and Kashmir constitution, which
limited voting rights for the state legislature to permanent residents,
disappeared when the 2019 Reorganisation Act outlawed the state’s
constitution. After the hollowing out of Article 370, any person ‘ordinarily
resident’ in Jammu and Kashmir became eligible to enlist as a voter. In
March 2020, a new definition of domicile for Jammu and Kashmir was
introduced, whereby (a) any person residing in Jammu and Kashmir for
more than 15 years, (b) any person who had studied in Jammu and Kashmir
for more than 7 years, and (c) any person who was registered as a migrant by
the Relief and Rehabilitation Commissioner (Migrants) in the Union
Territory of Jammu and Kashmir, were eligible to be permanent residents.20
Over 3.2 million people were reported to have been granted permanent
residency by the end of 2020 under the new domicile rules, the bulk of them
descendants or dependents of former permanent residents in Jammu

15Gautam Bhatia, ‘Deepening Fait Accompli: The Supreme Court’s J&K Delimitation
Judgment – I’, Constitutional Law and Philosophy.
16Zulfikar Majid, ‘Jammu and Kashmir revision of electoral rolls completed second time in
a year’, Deccan Herald, May 28, 2023.
Zulfikar Majid, ‘Over seven lakh added in Jammu and Kashmir final voter list’, Deccan
17

Herald, November 25, 2022.

18Sanjay Khajuria, ‘Revised Jammu and Kashmir poll rolls may expand 33% with 25 lakh
new voters over 3 years: CEO’, Times of India, August 18, 2022.
19PTI, ‘Final electoral roll of J-K published with total of 8.69 million voters’, Business
Standard, January 23, 2024.
20CG-DL-E-31032020-218978, The Gazette of India,
https://static.pib.gov.in/WriteReadData/userfiles/218978.pdf.

10
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province, through an accelerated process which cut through the labyrinth of

red tape which earlier existed.21

Despite the revisions, many Kashmiri Pandits found their names were
missing from the electoral rolls when they went to vote in the Jammu
constituency during the 2024 Lok Sabha polls.22

Expansion of reserved seats

The 2019 Reorganisation Act increased the total number of legislative
assembly seats from 107 to 114, of which 24 seats are kept vacant till such
time as the former princely state is reunited; in effect, the number of seats to
be contested is 90. Following the passage of the Jammu and Kashmir
Reorganisation (Amendment) Act of 2023 in December 2023, 16 of these
seats will be reserved: 7 for scheduled castes and 9 for scheduled tribes. The
number of nominated members has also increased from 2 for women to 5,
including two members from the ‘Kashmiri Migrant community’ (Kashmiri
Pandits) and one member who is a displaced person from Pakistani-held
Jammu and Kashmir.23

It is unclear how this increase will impact the legislative assembly election.
Given the demography of Jammu and the valley, the bulk of reserved seats
will be in Jammu. Of the 9 seats reserved for scheduled tribes, 6 are in
Jammu and 3 in Kashmir. The 7 seats reserved for scheduled castes are also
in Jammu.24 In total, 13 of Jammu’s 43 seats are reserved.

Shuja-ul-Haq, ‘Over 32 lakh people in J&K issued domicile certificates till end of 2020:
21

MHA in Parliament’, India Today, March 16, 2021.

PTI, ‘Scores of Kashmiri Pandits return without voting in Jammu after finding names
22

missing from roll’, The Hindu, May 13, 2024.

23Jammu and Kashmir Reorganisation (Amendment) Bill, 2023,
https://www.lawrbit.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/01/jammu-and-kashmir-
reorganisation-amendment-act-2023-pdf.pdf; Meetu Jain, ‘Amid Discussion Over Article
370 Verdict, Parliament Clears Bills ‘Reserving’ Seats in J&K Assembly’, The Wire,
December 12, 2023.
24Office of the Chief Electoral Officer, ‘Delimitation of Constituencies in Union Territory of
Jammu & Kashmir’,
https://cdn.s3waas.gov.in/s330ef30b64204a3088a26bc2e6ecf7602/uploads/2022/05/20
22051069.pdf.

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Both the scheduled castes and tribes’ lists have also been recently expanded.
In February 2024, parliament enacted the Constitution (Jammu and
Kashmir) Scheduled Tribes Order (Amendment) Bill, 2024 and the
Constitution (Jammu and Kashmir) Scheduled Castes Order (Amendment)
Bill, 2024. The former added Gadda Brahmins, Kolis, Paddaris and Paharis
to the Scheduled Tribes list, while the latter added the Valmiki community
as a synonym of Chura, Balmiki, Bhangi and Mehtar communities to the list
of Scheduled Castes.25

Further clipping the powers of an elected administration

Most worrying of all, the Union administration has just clipped the powers
of an elected administration and assembly pre-emptively, even before the
legislative assembly election is held. Amended rules under Section 55 of the
2019 Reorganization Act were added in February 2024 but notified only in
July. They specify that all issues concerning the police, public order,
transfers, postings and appointment of Jammu and Kashmir’s attorney-
general will have to be approved by the lieutenant-governor. So will sanction
for prosecution.26 Moreover, all policies or initiatives that required the state
finance ministry’s concurrence will now require that of the lieutenant-
governor. His decisions cannot be reviewed by the Council of Ministers,
which is restricted to 10 percent of the members of the legislative assembly.
His representative is mandated to attend all cabinet meetings. Even the
ministers’ schedules and/or agendas of meetings will have to be submitted
to his office at least two days earlier.27

In other words, the elected administration and legislature will not be able to
repeal the Public Safety Act (PSA) or prevent the suppression of dissent
and/or administrative misuse of laws such as the PSA, the Unlawful
Activities (Prevention) Act (UAPA) and the Official Secrets Act.

25PTI, ‘Parliament Passes 3 Bills on J&K’, Kashmir Observer, February 9, 2024; PTI, ‘Lok
Sabha passes Bill granting ST status to Pahari and Paddari in Jammu and Kashmir’, The
Print, February 9, 2024.
26Ananya Bhardwaj, ‘MHA broadens powers of J&K L-G, gives him more say in matters of
police, public order, postings’, The Print, July 13, 2024.
27Kanwal Singh, ‘Latest Changes in Government Rules Reveal Statehood for J&K to
Remain a Distant Dream’, The Wire, July 17, 2024.

12
ELECTIONS

Nor will the new administration have command over the bureaucracy since
it will have no control over their appointments or transfers. It will not be able
to act on complaints against civil servants either, since only the lieutenant-
governor can sanction prosecutions. Indeed, under a circular issued by the
General Administration Department (Vigilance) on June 20, 2024, titled
‘Handling of complaints against public servants’, complainants be unable to
seek aid from an elected administration. They will also be liable to prosecution
if their complaints are deemed “false/frivolous/anonymous/pseudonymous”.28

Any initiatives at reform will, therefore, be dependent on a lieutenant-

governor who answers to the Union administration not the Jammu and
Kashmir administration or people. The risk of administrative loggerhead is
high, as has been seen in Delhi, where a similar division of powers between
an elected administration and nominated authority has had an extremely
negative impact on the delivery of services.

The parallel between Delhi’s partial statehood and the status accorded to
Jammu and Kashmir under the 2019 Reorganization Act was noted in the
Forum’s 2023 report. At the time, it was recommended that implementation
of the act should be put on hold until an elected legislature was in place and
the Supreme Court had ruled on a clutch of petitions challenging the vitiation
of Article 370 and the Reorganization Act.29 The court subsequently upheld
the Union’s actions. But it did not examine the Reorganization Act provision
by provision, perhaps because it was assured that the Union Territory status
was temporary.

The new rules betray the aspirations of the people of Jammu and Kashmir,
whose search for representation was demonstrated by the turnout in the
April-May Lok Sabha polls. Most regional parties have protested them. They
degrade the chief minister to a ‘powerless rubber stamp’, former chief
minister Omar Abdullah said; former chief minister Mehbooba Mufti added
that they reduce Jammu and Kashmir to a municipality. They represent ‘the
murder of democracy’, the Jammu and Kashmir head of the Congress party

28Ashutosh Sharma, ‘Jammu and Kashmir’s new circular on handling complaints against
officials sparks outrage’, Frontline, July 15, 2024.
29The Forum for Human Rights in Jammu and Kashmir, Five Years Without an Elected
Administration: Human Rights in Jammu and Kashmir, August 2022 to July 2023, 8.

13
 ELECTIONS
said. Even the breakaway Apni Party head Altaf Bukhari appealed to all
Jammu and Kashmir parties to oppose the new rules together.30

Whether the rules can be notified through a simple statute is also

questionable. In the case of Delhi, similar rules were issued through a
constitutional amendment. This is an issue the 18 th Lok Sabha could look
into.

The all-important issue of statehood

Criticising the new rules, Congress president Mallikarhun Kharge and the
PDP’s media advisor Iltija Mufti said they made evident that the Union
administration had no intention of restoring statehood anytime soon.31

That would seem to be the most likely inference to be drawn. There would be
little point in issuing the new rules if they were going to be withdrawn with
the return of statehood soon after the legislative assembly election. When
asked by the Supreme Court on a timeline for statehood in December 2023,
the Union was unable to provide an answer. Solicitor-General Tushar Mehta
said, ‘Complete statehood may take some time as the State had faced
repeated and consistent disturbances for decades together… I assure you we
are progressively proceeding to make Jammu and Kashmir a complete
state.’32 At the same time, Home Minister Shah’s statement in parliament
that the security forces would achieve total ‘area domination’ by 2026 – a
possibly foolhardy assertion discussed in the next section, on civilian security
– implies that statehood might be delayed till after that.33

In response to the solicitor-general, the court said it accepted the Union’s

argument of security considerations for delay but urged continuing attention
to restoration of statehood. The bench was not ruling on the issue of whether
Article 3 permits demotion of a state to a Union Territory – petitioners had

30PTI, ‘J&K Political Parties Oppose Centre’s Move to Give More Powers to LG’, Kashmir
Observer, July 13, 2024; Th Wire Staff, ‘Uproar as Modi Government Gives More Powers
to Lieutenant-Governor Ahead of J&K Assembly Polls’, The Wire, July 13, 2024.
31 Ibid.
32Krishnadas Rajagopal, ‘Unable to give exact date when J&K Statehood would be
restored, Centre tells Supreme Court’, The Hindu, August 31, 2023.
33GK News Service, ‘Zero terror plan, complete area domination in J&K to be
completed by 2026: Amit Shah’, Greater Kashmir, December 8, 2023.

14
ELECTIONS

argued that it did not – because the solicitor-general had assured that
statehood was only suspended, the chief justice said.34 In May 2024, Prime
Minister Modi promised return of statehood ‘soon’; Mr. Shah had similarly
promised parliament as far back as November 2019.35 Will the court accept
indefinite postponement?

Putting together the new rules and the solicitor-general’s statement that
statehood would be restored ‘progressively’, there is now an added danger
that if or when statehood is restored, it might be only partial, on the hybrid
state-Union Territory formula that Delhi is under. Indeed, the new rules
discussed above impose even more stringent controls over an elected
administration and legislators than the Delhi formula does. In 2023, the
Supreme Court ruled that the elected Delhi administration had authority
over appointments and transfers, excluding in the departments of public
order, police and land. According to the then Constitution bench, ‘If a
democratically elected government is not allowed to control its officers and
hold them to account, then its responsibility towards the legislature and
public is diluted. If officers feel they are insulated from the elected
government, they feel they are not accountable.’36

With regard to Jammu and Kashmir, the Supreme Court did not deal with
the issue of whether a phased restoration of statehood would be acceptable
under Article 3, nor whether a hybrid state-Union Territory status could
replace full statehood, since neither possibility was anticipated. Now, with
the Union administration’s envisaged plan becoming clearer – to first hold
elections to the Union Territory, and then consider partial statehood on the
Delhi lines, with full restoration at an undefined future time – the
constitutional question of what Article 3 does or does not permit becomes
salient. Jammu and Kashmir cannot be compared to Delhi, nor can the latter
set a precedent for the former. While Jammu and Kashmir had full statehood
before it was divided and demoted to a Union Territory, Delhi was a Union

34The Wire Analysis, ‘Four Important Takeaways From the Supreme Court Ruling on
Jammu and Kashmir’, The Wire, December 11, 2023.
PTI, ‘Restoration of J&K statehood is ‘solemn promise’ we have made, we stand by it:
35

PM Modi’, The Hindu, May 20, 2024.

Scroll Staff, ‘Delhi government has control over bureaucrats, rules Supreme Court, Scroll.in,
36

May 11, 2023.

15
 ELECTIONS
Territory that acquired partial statehood. Under Article 3, the trajectory is an
upward one of a Union Territory moving to a state, since the goal is popular
representation. Surely a downward trajectory, of a state being turned into a
Union Territory and then having to move only gradually up to statehood is
not permissible. In light of the Supreme Court’s Delhi judgement, moreover,
surely the July 12 rules are unconstitutional?

Potential police hostility

This Forum has also taken note of Jammu and Kashmir Director-General of
Police R.R. Swain’s statement on July 14, 2024, that ‘Pakistan successfully
infiltrated all important aspects of civil society, thanks to so-called
mainstream or regional politics in the valley. There is ample evidence to show
that many had owned the art of running with the hare and hunting with the
hound.’37 To make such grave allegations without offering concrete evidence
or explaining what action was taken – and if not, why not – sows doubt on
both his competence and his accountability as an officer appointed by the
Union administration.

It also raises questions on the extent to which the police will cooperate with
an elected administration. These doubts need to be dispelled immediately,
preferably in a statement by the Union home minister.

Ladakh
Resentment has also been mounting in Ladakh over the loss of executive
powers of its elected hill councils and the Union administration’s prolonged
indecision on the demand to be included in the Sixth Schedule which
provides for autonomies and subsidies to tribal-majority regions. The twin
issues were discussed in detail in the Forum’s 2023 report, which included a
special section on Ladakh, but there has been now forward movement on
them as of this writing.

KO Web Desk, ‘J&K Parties Cultivated Terror Leaders for Votes: DGP’, Kashmir
37

Observer, July 15, 2024.

16
CIVILIAN SECURITY

CIVILIAN SECURITY
Overall security situation
Jammu and Kashmir’s overall security had improved slightly between
August 2023 to June 2024. The total number of deaths in the region due to
militant attacks and counter-insurgency operations fell from 137 between
August 1, 2022-July 30, 2023, to 104 between August 1, 2023-June 15,
2024.38 However, the rise of terrorist attacks on civilians and security forces
in June, which intensified in July, means that casualty figures for this year
are much the same as in the previous year. Civilian deaths have increased
from 19 to 20 between August 2023-July 22, 2024; security forces’ casualties
have increased from 21 to 33 and rising.

Incidents of arms recoveries fell from 153 in August 2022-July 2023 to 119
in August 2023-July 2024. The number of explosions too fell during the same
period, from 19 explosions with 10 dead and 21 injured in the previous year
(August 2022-July 2023), to 2 explosions with no deaths and 4 injuries in
August 2023-July 2024.39

Continuing militancy in Jammu

Militancy has continued to rise in the Pir Panjal and Chenab valley districts
of Jammu province and spread further to Kathua district due to a
combination of circumstances. The redeployment of several troop
contingents to the Line of Actual Control (LAC) following Chinese incursions
in 2020, an issue that is yet to be resolved, left gaps in Jammu province’s
security and intelligence grids. The rise of attacks on Muslims across much
of India, a reservation policy that pitted Paharis against Gujjars, and the
2022 delimitation also alienated many in the Poonch-Rajouri region
bordering Pakistan, recreating pockets of support for cross-border
infiltration that had ceased to exist over the past fifteen years (see the
Forum’s 2023 report, Five Years Without an Elected Administration:

38South Asia Terrorism Portal, Datasheets: Jammu and Kashmir, Fatalities Between
2000-2024, Yearly Fatalities, Daily Fatalities, https://www.satp.org/datasheet-terrorist-
attack/fatalities/india-jammukashmir.

39South Asia Terrorism Portal, Data Sheets: Jammu and Kashmir, Yearly Arms Recovery,
Daily Arms Recovery, 2000-2024, https://www.satp.org/datasheet-terrorist-
attack/recovery-of-arms/india-jammukashmir; Datasheets: Jammu and Kashmir, Yearly
Explosions, Daily Explosions, 2000-2024, https://www.satp.org/datasheet-terrorist-
attack/explosions/india-jammukashmir.

17
 CIVILIAN SECURITY
Human Rights in Jammu and Kashmir, for a fuller discussion of these
factors).

On December 21, 2023, militants attacked two army vehicles carrying

personnel for a counter-insurgency operation in the Rajouri district.40 Four
soldiers were killed in the attack, while a further three were injured.41

On June 9, 2024, militants opened fire on a bus carrying pilgrims in the Reasi
district, killing the driver, Vijay Kumar and forcing the bus to fall into a
gorge.42 Nine people died, and more than 30 others were injured. Amongst
those killed were Ruby and Anurag Verma, cousins aged 22 and 16, and a 2-
year-old child.43 Reportedly, the attack was carried out on the instructions of
Lashkar-e-Taiba commander Abu Hamza.44

The attack took place on the first day of the Prime Minister’s third term, a
mere hour before his swearing-in. Like Poonch-Rajouri, where militancy
resurfaced after 15 years, the Reasi district had been a peaceful region for
more than 20 years.

Two days later, on June 11, an encounter took place in Kathua, again a district
that had long been peaceful. At 7:45 p.m., 2 militants looking for drinking
water in the Sohal Kootah area allegedly forced their way into Onkar Nath’s
house, injuring him.45 In the exchange of fire with police that followed, both

40The Hindu Bureau, ‘Three Army personnel killed in J&K ambush’, The Hindu, December
21, 2023.

41Livemint, ‘Poonch terror attack: Search ops begin in Jammu and Kashmir, 4 soldiers
killed. What we know so far’, Mint, December 22, 2023.

42 Jahangir Sofi, ‘Jammu Hots Up’, Kashmir Life, June 19, 2024.

43Ashutosh Sharma, ‘Fresh militant attacks cast shadow over Assembly election in Jammu
and Kashmir’, Frontline, June 15, 2024.

PTI, ‘Reasi Attack: Combing Operation Enters Second Day, Over 20 Picked up For
44

Questioning’, Kashmir Observer, June 11, 2024.

45Peerzada Ashiq, ‘CRPF jawan and two militants killed, sever security personnel injured
in three Jammu encounters’, The Hindu, June 12, 2024.

18
CIVILIAN SECURITY

militants and a CRPF personnel were killed.46 Security forces recovered a

large number of arms and ammunition from the site, including a U.S.-made
M4 carbine and Pakistan-made medicines and food, along with ₹100,000.47

On the same day, a group of militants attacked a joint check post in

Chattergalla on the Bhaderwah-Pathankot Road. Five Rashtriya Rifles troops
and a Special Police Officer were injured in the attack. A cordon and search
operation (CASO) began shortly after to capture the group, which is
suspected to consist of 3 or 4 militants.48

On June 12, a police search team was fired upon in Doda district. In the
ensuing exchange of fire, Constable Fareed Ahmed was injured.49 Following
these attacks, security forces detained around 50 people. Residents of Reasi
and surrounding areas have complained of harassment in the ongoing
investigations.50

On June 27, again in the Doda district, the army and the Jammu and Kashmir
police claimed that three militants were killed in a counter-insurgency
operation.51

46PTI, ‘Kathua terror attack: Villager’s quick alert averts major tragedy’, The Economic
Times, June 12, 2024.

47 KNO, ‘2 Militants, CPRF Jawan Killed in Kathua’, Kashmir Observer, June 12, 2024.

48PTI, ‘Search operation on to neutralise terrorists present in higher reaches of J&K’s

Doda: Police’, Deccan Herald, June 12, 2024.

49Sunil Bhat, ‘Cop injured in gunfight in Jammu and Kashmir’s Doda, fourth terror attack
in 3 days’, India Today, June 13, 2024.

50 Ashutosh Sharma, ‘Fresh militant attacks cast shadow over Assembly election in Jammu
and Kashmir’, Frontline, June 15, 2024; PTI, ‘Jammu Attacks: Omar accuses J&K Admin
of Harassing Locals, ‘Incompetence’’, Kashmir Observer, June 13, 2024.

Peerzada Ashiq, ‘Three militants killed in day-long operation in J&K’s Doda: officials’,
51

The Hindu, June 27, 2024.

19
 CIVILIAN SECURITY
On July 7, a soldier was injured when militants opened fire on an army camp
in Rajouri district. The attack was repulsed but the perpetrators managed to
escape.52

On July 8, militants ambushed two army trucks carrying 12 troops in the

Kathua district, which has historically been insurgency-free. In the ensuing
exchange of fire, 5 soldiers were killed, and 6 others injured.53 The militants
used armour-piercing bullets. The Kashmir Tigers, an offshoot of the banned
Jaish-e-Mohammad, claimed responsibility for the attack.54

In ongoing search operations in the forest belt bordering Kishtwar district, a

Rashtriya Rifles and Special Operations Group engaged a group of militants
on July 9, but the latter escaped.55 On July 15, as search operations continued
in the Desa forest area of Doda district, four soldiers, including an officer,
were killed and one injured. Apparently, the militants had U.S. made M4
carbines and night vision scopes. Counter-insurgency operations are ongoing
as of this writing.56

Reportedly, there are around 60 foreign terrorists operating in the Jammu

province, who have been trained in jungle warfare.

Armed attacks also continue in the valley. On April 11, a Lashkar-e-Taiba

terrorist was killed in a shootout with security forces in Pulwama 57; on April
24, two soldiers were injured in an exchange of fire with militants in

52PTI, ‘Soldier injured as militants open fire on Army camp in J-K’s Rajouri’, The Indian
Express, July 7, 2024.

53Naseer Ganai, ‘Jammu Kashmir: 5 Soldiers Killed in Kathua After Militants Attack Army
Vehicle’, Outlook, July 8, 2024.

54PTI, ‘5 soldiers killed, 5 injured as terrorists attack Army vehicles in Kathua’, Business
Standard, July 8, 2024.

55 GK News Service, ‘Fresh Encounter starts in Doda’, Greater Kashmir, July 10, 2024.

PTI, ‘Officer Among Four Soldiers Killed in Encounter in J&K’s Doda’, Kashmir
56

Observer, July 16, 2024.

PTI, ‘Terrorist Killed in Encounter With Security Forces In J&K's Pulwama’, NDTV.com,
57

April 11, 2024.

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Bandipora58; and on April 26, a counter-insurgency operation began in

Sopore.59 On June 17, a militant was killed in an exchange for fire with
security forces in Bandipora. On June 19, two militants were killed and a
soldier and a policeman were injured in the ongoing counter-insurgency
operation in Sopore.60

Between July 6 and 7, in a counter-insurgency operation in Kulgam, six

militants were killed, one of them said to be a ‘top commander’ of the Hizbul
Mujahideen. Two soldiers were also killed.61

According to the South Asia Terrorism Portal, there have been 26 fatalities
in the Jammu division and 34 in Kashmir between January-July 16, 2024. A
major difference is that 11 troops have lost their lives in the Jammu division
in contrast to 2 in the Kashmir division; similarly, 4 militants have been
killed in Jammu as against 26 in Kashmir.62

Targeting minorities
This past year, no Kashmiri Pandit has been killed, but threats against the
community continue.63 A day before the Prime Minister’s rally at Maulana
Azad Stadium in Jammu on February 20, 2024, Kashmiri Pandit
government employees received a voicemail demanding they ‘leave the valley

58The Hindu Bureau, ‘Two soldiers injured in J&K gunfight with militants’, The Hindu,
April 24, 2024.

59Peerzada Ashiq, ‘Encounter between security forces and militants starts in Sopore in
north Kashmir’ The Hindu, April 26, 2024.

60Peerzada Ashiq, ‘Two militants killed in Sopore; local arrested over Reasi attack’, The
Hindu, June 19, 2024.

61Peerzaha Ashiq, ‘Four terrorists dead in encounter at Jammu and Kashmir’s Kulgam;
two soldiers feared killed’, The Hindu, July 6, 2024; Peerzada Ashiq, ‘With 2 more killed, 6
militants dead in long operation at Kulgam’, The Hindu, July 7, 2024.

62Ajai Sahni, ‘Examining the Claims Regarding a 'Shift' in Terrorism from Kashmir to
Jammu’, The Quint, July 18, 2024.

63The Forum for Human Rights in Jammu and Kashmir, Five Years Without an Elected
Administration: Human Rights in Jammu and Kashmir, August 2022 to July 2023, 21-
23.

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or face the consequences.’64 The People’s Anti-Fascist Front, an offshoot of
the Jaish-e-Mohammad, claimed it had issued the threat.

The role of social media in provoking communal tension was also noted when
a dispute over a parking spot in Verinag between a Kashmiri Pandit resident
and a Muslim neighbour seeking to build on the spot was misrepresented as
Muslims refusing to let a returning Kashmiri Pandit build his house. The post
and video, by a pro-BJP tweeter, went viral. A fact-check showed that the
Kashmiri Pandit concerned was a long-term resident and the dispute had
been settled by the Auqaf board, which ruled in favour of the Pandit.65

Independent initiatives at reconciliation continue. On the occasion of the

Kashmiri Pandits’ Kheer Bhavani festival, Mirwaiz Umar Farooq, the
Hurriyat conference chairman, urged displaced Pandits to return to their
homeland. It was time to ‘rebuild the broken bonds’, he said. ‘We owe it to
our next generation.’ 66

Migrant workers still under threat

Targeted attacks on migrant workers, as noted in the Forum’s 2022 and 2023
reports, continue.67

On October 30, 2023, Mukesh Kumar, a brick kiln worker from Uttar
Pradesh who was buying essentials, was shot dead by militants at the border
of the Pulwama and Budgam districts.68

64Express News Service, ‘Ahead of PM’s J&K visit, militants list Pandit staff, issue threat
via voice note’, The New Indian Express, February 20, 2024.

News Desk, ‘Fact-Check: Property dispute at Verinag Kashmir between neighbors

65

misportrayed as communal tension’, The Kashmiriyat, June 8, 2024.

66PTI, ‘Time to Rebuild Broken Bonds: Mirwaiz to KP’s’, Kashmir Observer, June 14,
2024.

67The Forum for Human Rights in Jammu and Kashmir, Three Years as a Union
Territory: Human Rights in J&K (August 2021-July 2022), 3-4; The Forum for Human
Rights in Jammu and Kashmir, Five Years Without an Elected Administration: Human
Rights in Jammu and Kashmir, August 2022 to July 2023, 24-25.

68Bashaarat Masood, ‘UP man working in Kashmir brick kiln shot dead in terror attack’,
The Indian Express, October 30, 2023.

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On February 7, 2024, Amritpal Singh and Rohit, carpenters from Amritsar,

were gunned down by militants in Srinagar’s old city. Singh was instantly
shot dead, while Rohit was injured, succumbing to his wounds the following
day. This was the first targeted killing of 2024.69

Dilranjeet Singh from Dehradun, Uttarakhand, was shot by militants in

Herpora in the Shopian district on April 8, 2024; he was rushed to the
hospital shortly after and was in stable condition. 70 Raju Shah from Bihar
was shot dead in Bijbehara town in Anantnag district on April 18, 2024.
According to his mother, he sold pakodas (vegetable fritters), and left behind
a wife and son. He was the sole earner of the family. 71

Since 2017, around 31 migrant workers have been killed in the region. Many
come in search of better wages than available in their hometowns,
acknowledging the risks that come with it, as migrant workers, a significant
number of whom are Dalit or Adivasi72, have been repeatedly attacked in
Kashmir. Many, such as Mukesh Kumar, were urged against working in the
region. Rajesh Kumar, an acquaintance of Mukesh, pleaded with him not to
go, but ‘he wanted to send money urgently to his wife and four children. His
desperation led him to his death like this.’

Targeted killing of migrant workers has risen to such a point that a teacher
in Pulwama, Faisal Parray, said he had helped transport at least 20 migrant
workers’ bodies back home on his own funds since 2022.73 The Jammu and

69Scroll Staff, ‘Jammu and Kashmir: Two migrant workers from Punjab shot dead by
suspected militants’, Scroll.in, February 8, 2024; PTI, ‘Migrant worker from Punjab shot
dead by terrorists in Srinagar, 1 injured’, Business Standard, February 7, 2024.

70NDTV Newsdesk, ‘Migrant worker shot at by suspected terrorists in Jammu and

Kashmir’s Shopian’

71Scroll Staff, ‘Jammu and Kashmir: Worker from Bihar shot dead by suspected militants
in Anantnag’, Scroll.in, April 18, 2024.

72Aijaz Ahmad Turrey, ‘Impact of Conflict on Labour Migrants in Kashmir’, Economic and
Political Weekly, August 12, 2023.

Tarushi Aswani, ‘In Kashmir’s Pulwama, a Teacher Facilitates the Return of Migrant
73

Worker’s Bodies to Their Families’, The Wire, December 6, 2023.

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Kashmir administration subsequently reimbursed Parray for the costs
incurred.

Village Defence Guards targeted

Following the rise of militancy in Jammu, Village Defence Guards (VDCs)
have begun to be targeted. In April 2024, a guard was shot in Udhampur
district. In July, the house of guard Parshotam Kumar in Gunda, Rajouri, was
attacked; he escaped unhurt but his relative was injured. Kumar had been
awarded the Shaurya Chakra for exceptional bravery in counter-insurgency
that led to the death of a militant in his village earlier.74

National Investigation Agency (NIA) raids

In continuing counter-terrorism operations that suppressed dissent, the NIA
conducted raids across Srinagar, Budgam, Kupwara and Pulwama districts
in August 2023, against the Jammu Kashmir Coalition of Civil Societies
(JKCCS), a group that brought out an annual human rights report. The NGO
was alleged to have been involved in raising funds for terrorist
organizations. 75

In December 2023, the NIA conducted raids across seven districts in

connection with a ‘terror conspiracy hatched by the offshoots of the banned
Pakistan-backed terrorist organisations’76, such as the Laskhar-e-Taiba,
Jaish-e-Mohammed, Hizb-ul-Mujahideen, Al-Badr and Al-Qaeda, as well as
new groups like the United Liberation Front Jammu and Kashmir (ULFJK)
and Kashmir Tigers. The raids were in continuation of an investigation that
began in June 2022 (RC-05/2022/NIA/JMU), noted in the Forum’s 2023
report.77 According to the NIA, these groups had recruited social media
operatives to promote terror and use of drones to deliver arms, ammunition,
explosives and narcotics.78 Another series of raids was conducted in April

74The Wire Staf, ‘J&K Cops Warn of UAPA Against Those Sharing Proaganda Video of
2015 Film “Phantom”’, The Wire, July 23, 2024.

75The Hindu Bureau, ‘NIA raids seven locations in Kashmir in NGO terror-funding case’,
The Hindu, August 20, 2023.

76 PTI, ‘NIA Raids in Seven J&K Districts’, Kashmir Observer, December 5, 2023.

77The
Forum for Human Rights in Jammu and Kashmir, Five Years Without an Elected
Administration: Human Rights in Jammu and Kashmir, August 2022 to July 2023, 25.

78 PTI, ‘NIA Raids in Seven J&K Districts’, Kashmir Observer, December 5, 2023.
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2024, during which the NIA claimed it found ‘digital devices containing large
volumes of incriminating data and documents.’79

A juvenile was arrested in January 2024 by the NIA in connection to the 2023
Dhangri terrorist attack, which killed seven people. 80

Crimes against children and juvenile crimes

According to the National Crime Records Bureau (NCRB), the number of
crimes against children has continued to rise, a trend that was noted in the
Forum’s 2023 report.81 In 2019, 470 crimes were reported to have been
committed against children in Jammu and Kashmir, which at that time
included Ladakh; by 2021, the figure had shot up to 845 for Jammu and
Kashmir alone; in 2022, it rose further to 920.82

The reported number of juvenile crimes also increased from 299 in 2019 to
323 in 2021 and 361 in 2022.83 Notably, the rate of increase in crimes against
children was far sharper than the rate of increase in crimes committed by
juveniles.

79The Hindu Bureau, ‘NIA raids 9 locations in Kashmir, seizes incriminating digital data’,
The Hindu, April 22, 2024.

80 PTI, ‘NIA Arrests Juvenile in Rajouri Attack Case’, Kashmir Observer, January 21, 2024.

81The Forum for Human Rights in Jammu and Kashmir, Five Years Without an Elected
Administration: Human Rights in Jammu and Kashmir, August 2022 to July 2023, 25-
26.

82National Crime Records Bureau (NCRB), Crime in India 2022, Chapter 4A: Crime
Against Children (States & UTs), TABLE 4A.1 Crimes against Children (IPC+SSL) – 2020-
2022, 317; National Crime Records Bureau (NCRB), Crime in India 2021, Chapter 4A:
Crime Against Children (States & UTs), TABLE 4A.1: Crime against Children (IPC+SSL) –
2019-2021, 317.

83National Crime Records Bureau (NCRB), Crime in India 2022, Chapter 5A: Juveniles in
Conflict with Law (States & UTs), TABLE 5A.1 Crimes Committed by Juveniles (IPC+SSL)
– 2020-2022, 427; National Crime Records Bureau (NCRB), Crime in India 2021, Chapter
5A: Juveniles in Conflict with Law (States & UTs) TABLE 5A.1: Crime Committed by
Juveniles (IPC+SSL) – 2019-2021, 427.

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Crimes against women
In contrast to the rise in crimes against children, the 2023 NCRB report
showed a slight decline in crimes against women between 2021 and 2022. In
2021, the total number of reported crimes against women was 3,937; in 2022,
it fell to 3,716.84 Of the 3,937 cases reported in 2021, 1,929 were still pending
investigation in 2022. Of the 5,667 cases investigated in 2022, 1,208 were
declared false.85 The majority of cases continued to be of sexual harassment
and kidnapping.86 News reports also indicate that transgender women,
ostracized by their families and the wider community, have increasingly been
pushed into prostitution post the Covid-19 lockdowns.87

Crimes against Scheduled Castes and Tribes

Though the Union administration justified the abrogation of Article 35A on
the grounds that it had ‘forced Dalits in Jammu into a pathetic life’88, Pawan
Loni, the President of the Bhim Army in Jammu and Kashmir, warned, ‘We
believe that with people from outside settling in Jammu now, the atrocities
against Dalits will see a rise.’89 Current figures appear to validate the Bhim
Army’s fears. Incidents of crimes against Scheduled Castes have increased
from 0.20 (per 100,000) in 2020-2021 to 1.20 in 2023-2024; in the same

84National Crime Records Bureau (NCRB), Crime in India 2022, Chapter 3A: Crime
Against Women (States & UTs), TABLE 3A.1, Crimes against Women (IPC+SSL) – 2020-
2022, 211.

85National Crime Records Bureau (NCRB), Crime in India 2022, Chapter 3A: Crime
Against Women (States & UTs), TABLE 3A.6, Police Disposal of Crime Against Women
(State/UT-wise) – 2022, 238-239.

86National Crime Records Bureau (NCRB), Crime in India 2022, Chapter 3A: Crime
Against Women (States & UTs), TABLE 3A.1, Crimes against Women (Crime Head-wise &
State/UT-wise) – 2020-2022, 212-227.

87Gafira Qadir, ‘‘Forced to Do Sex Work for Survival’: The Fate of Trans Women in
Kashmir’, The Quint, July 19, 2024.

88‘Full text of document on govt.’s rationale behind removal of special status to J&K’, The
Hindu, August 5, 2019, https://www.thehindu.com/news/national/full-text-of-document-
on-govts-rationale-behind-removal-of-special-status-to-jk/article28821368.ece.

89 Ibid.

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period, crimes against Scheduled Tribes have gone from 0 per 100,000 to
0.10.90

Right of families to perform last rites

In June 2024, Harsh Nagotra, a resident of Jourian in Jammu’s Akhnoor

district, went missing. It was later found that he had drowned in the
Chenab river and his body was washed up in Pakistan. His family were
informed by a WhatsApp message from a Pakistani official and appealed to
the Prime Minister for help in the return of Harsh’s body. When they
received no response, they approached the Jammu and Kashmir High
Court. Though the High Court dismissed their petititon, the bench took suo
moto notice of the issue and sent notices to the Union of India through the
Ministry of Home Affairs, the Ministry of External Affairs, and to the Union
Territory of Jammu and Kashmir through the Secretary to the Government,
Ministry of Home.91

UAPA and PSA cases

Since the hollowing out of Article 370, there has been a massive uptick in
arrests under draconian laws. According to news reports citing official
sources, over 2,700 people were booked under the UAPA and PSA between
2020 and December 2023, 1,100 of them as ‘overground workers’ or
facilitators of armed insurgents.92 Media figures and activists continue to
face harassment and arrests.

In 2022, Jammu and Kashmir had the highest number of offences against
the state amongst Union Territories and the third highest amongst all states
and Union Territories, according to the NCRB, with a total of 421 cases of

90NITI Aayog, ‘SDG India Index 2023-24: Towards Viksit Bharat Sustainable Progress,
Inclusive Growth’, 269.
91
GK Web Desk, ‘J&K High Court takes suo moto cognizance to expedite retrieval of
drowned man’s body from Pakistan’, Greater Kashmir, July 26, 2024; Arun Sharma, ‘A
gaming app loss, a WhatsApp message from Pakistan, and heartbreak for J&K family who lost son’,
The Indian Express, July 15, 2024.

Naveed Iqbal, ‘Security situation: More arrests, crackdown on network supporting

92

militants’, The Indian Express, December 11, 2023.

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offences against the state, including 371 under the UAPA. 93 In India as a
whole, 1,005 UAPA cases were reported during the year. Jammu and
Kashmir had the highest number of UAPA cases amongst all Union
Territories and states, amounting to 36.9 percent of all UAPA cases.

616 of the 1,308 cases of offences against the state that were investigated
were disposed of by the police.94 There are still numerous detainees under
the PSA who remain in prison.95 The total number of detenus in Jammu and
Kashmir is 546 (12.6 per cent of the country’s detenus), which includes those
held under the PSA.96

Continuing media crackdown

The Jammu and Kashmir administration has continued to use the UAPA and
PSA to crack down on journalists. As of January 19, 2024, 7 journalists were
jailed in India, according to the Committee to Protect Journalists. Of these,
4 were from Jammu and Kashmir. Two were booked under the UAPA and
two under the PSA.97

Fresh arrest: journalists, students, lawyers, devotees and

businessmen
In September 2023, the authorities detained Majid Hyderi under the PSA on
charges of criminal conspiracy, intimidation, extortion and defamation. It

93National Crime Records Bureau (NCRB), Crime in India 2022, Chapter 10A Offences
Against the State (States & UTs), TABLE 10A.2 Offences against State (IPC & SSL) – 2022,
880.

94National Crime Records Bureau (NCRB), Crime in India 2022, Chapter 10A Offences
Against the State (States & UTs), TABLE 10A.4 Police Disposal of Offences against State
(State/UT-wise) – 2022, 885-888.

95Sumedha Mittal, ‘Detention quashed, but several PSA prisoners languish in jail over
procedural delays’, newslaundry, January 30, 2024.

96National Crime Records Bureau (NCRB), Prison Statistics India 2022, Chapter 2
Prisoners – Types and Demography, 36.

97NL Team, ‘7 journalists behind bars in India, 5 charged under UAPA: CPJ’,
newslaundry, January 19, 2024.

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was alleged that the police had not presented a warrant at his arrest, although
the police deny this claim.98

Hyderi was an independent journalist and former Greater Kashmir editor

who regularly appeared on news channels. Reporters Without Borders
describes his views as moderate; they also note his frequent criticisms of
corruption and human rights abuses by the security forces.99

In November 2023, 7 Kashmiri students were arrested for celebrating India’s

loss at a men’s Cricket World Cup match. The students were studying at the
Sher-e-Kashmir University of Agricultural Sciences and Technology in
Ganderbal and allegedly shouted pro-Pakistan slogans. The charges under
UAPA were dropped a month later, and the students were granted bail.100

In early July 2024, the chairperson of the Kashmir Bar Association, Nazir
Ahmad Ronga, was arrested under the PSA at 1 am from his house in
Srinagar. The Bar Association had been planning to hold long-deferred
elections.101 A week later, the former General Secretary of the Kashmir Bar
Association, Mohammad Ashraf Bhat, was also arrested under the PSA.102

In the same month, 4 participants in the Muharram procession were arrested

under the UAPA for carrying Palestinian and Hezbollah flags. As Srinagar
MP Aga Ruhullah Mehdi asked, can the UAPA really be used against such
acts?103

98Anees Zargar, ‘Outrage as Kashmiri Journalist Majid Hyderi Booked Under PSA’,
Newsclick, September 19, 2023.

99Reporters Without Borders, ‘Terrorism charges still used to persecute journalists in

Jammu and Kashmir’, Reporters Without Borders, October 10, 2023.

100 Fayaz Bukhari, ‘Kashmiri Students arrested for celebrating India’s Cricket World Cup
defeat get bail’, Reuters, December 3, 2023.
101 The Hindu Bureau, ‘Hours after J&K Bar’s election notice, ad hoc president Nazir Ronga

‘arrested without warrant’ in Srinagar’, The Hindu, July 11, 2024.

102PTI, ‘Former Gen Secy of the Kashmir Bar Association Mohammad Ashraf Bhat
Arrested’, Kashmir Observer, July 18, 2024.

103Mayank Kumar, ‘4 held under UAPA for waving Hezbollah flag at Muharram rally in
Srinagar. Oppn slams ‘brazen’ arrests’, The Print, July 17, 2024.

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Again in July 2024, Jammu businessman and newspaper owner Tarun Behl
was arrested under the Official Secrets Act for allegedly circulating a secret
list of persons whose security cover was being withdrawn. 104 Behl has
subsequently been granted bail.105

Still languishing: Irfan Mehraj, Abdul Aala Fazli and Sajad Gul
The Forum’s 2023 report noted the arrest of journalist and human rights
activist Irfan Mehraj under the UAPA in March 2023. Despite repeated calls
for his release by civil society groups, he remains in prison.106

Abdul Aala Fazili, a student at the University of Kashmir, was arrested for
writing an article alleged to glorify terrorism and spread fake news. He
remains in prison.107

Sajad Gul, a journalist, was arrested in January 2022 under the PSA. He had
previously been charged in 2021 with inciting a riot for reporting on the
demolition of homes and businesses in a village. The Jammu and Kashmir
High Court quashed his 2022 case under the PSA as the detention order was
considered ‘vague.’108 Gul had never been given the FIRs registered against
him and other pertaining documents. Although the PSA case has been
quashed, he remains in prison.109

104The Wire Staff, ‘J&K Cops Raid Premises of Newspaper Owner Held for Circulating
Secret “Security Withdrawal” List’, The Wire, July 12, 2024.

105The Wire Staff, ‘J&K High Court Grrants Interim Bail to Newspaper Owner Held for
Circulating Security “Security Withdrawal” List’, The Wire, July 23, 2024.

106The
Forum for Human Rights in Jammu and Kashmir, Five Years Without an Elected
Administration: Human Rights in Jammu and Kashmir, August 2022 to July 2023, 27-
28.

107 The Wire Staff, ‘Kashmiri Journalist Fahad Shah Returns Home’, The Wire, November
23, 2023,; Al Jazeera, ‘Kashmiri journalist Fahad Shah walks out of jail after 600 days’, Al
Jazeera, November 23, 2023.

108Scroll Staff, ‘J&K High Court quashes journalist Sajad Gul’s detention under Public
Safety Act’, Scroll.in, November 18, 2023.

109 Mubashar Naik, ‘Weeks after PSA quashment, Kashmir journalist Sajad Gul remains in
jail’, Maktoob Media, January 3, 2024.

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Partially free: Fahad Shah

Fahad Shah, the owner and editor of the banned Kashmir Walla, whose
arrest was also noted in the Forum’s 2023 report, was released on bail in
November 2023 after over 600 days in prison. He was accused of glorifying
terrorism and spreading fake news after he published an article by Abdul
Aala Fazili, referred to above.

A division bench comprising Justices Atul Sreedharan and Mohan Lal

quashed charges against Shah under S.18 of the UAPA (abetting the
commission of a terrorist act or any act preparatory to the commission of a
terrorist act), S.121 of the IPC (waging war) and 153-B (promoting enmity
between different groups). Upholding these charges for publishing the
impugned article, the bench ruled, ‘would mean that any criticism of the
central government can be described as a terrorist act because the honour of
India is its incorporeal property. Such a proposition would collide headlong
with the fundamental right to freedom of speech and expression enshrined
in Article 19 of the constitution.’ However, the court retained charges under
S.13 of the UAPA (incites unlawful activity) and S.35 and 39 of the Foreign
Contribution Regulation Act.110

The Kashmir Walla news site was banned in August 2023 under Section 69A
of the Information Technology Act, 2000. Not only was the website taken
down, but the news site was evicted from its office space and its social media
accounts were blocked. This is not the first time the Kashmir Walla was
targeted. In 2022, the office and Shah’s residence were raided by the Jammu
and Kashmir State Investigative Agency (SIA).111

In and out: Asif Sultan

Asif Sultan, the former assistant editor of the magazine Kashmir Narrator,
was arrested in August 2018 for his story on Burhan Wani, a militant
commander killed in a shootout with the security forces. He has spent five
years in jail, first being booked under the UAPA for allegedly harbouring

110 The Wire Staff, ‘Kashmiri Journalist Fahad Shah Returns Home’, The Wire, November
23, 2023; Al Jazeera, ‘Kashmiri journalist Fahad Shah walks out of jail after 600 days’, Al
Jazeera, November 23, 2023; Scroll Staff, ‘Kashmiri journalist Fahad Shah released on bail
after 21 months in prison’, Scroll.in, November 23, 2023.

Jehangir Ali, ‘Union Government Blocks Website, Social Media Accounts of 'The
111

Kashmir Walla', The Wire, August 21, 2023.

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terrorists. In 2022, he was granted bail but booked immediately under the
PSA, which allows for detention without trial for two years. 112

In December 2023, the Jammu and Kashmir High Court quashed his
detention under the PSA. The authorities failed to supply Sultan with the
documents used to book him, thus rendering the detention illegal.113 He was
eventually released two months later, at the end of February 2024. He was
re-arrested a day after on charges under the UAPA and an incident of alleged
rioting in Srinagar’s Central Jail.114
He was again released in May 2024 after an order from special judge Sandeep
Gandotra that Sultan was incarcerated “without any reasonable
justification.”115 Although released, he was directed to appear before an
investigative officer whenever necessary and furnish information on mobile
numbers issued in his name; he was also asked to provide a bail bond worth
₹100,000.116

Kashmir-related UAPA prosecution in Delhi

In June 2024, the lieutenant-governor of Delhi, Vinai Kumar Saxena,
sanctioned prosecution of a 14-year-old case against writer Arundathi Roy
and professor Sheikh Showkat Hussain under the UAPA. The complaint was
filed by businessman and Kashmiri Pandit activist Sushil Pandit, who alleged
that Roy and Hussain made provocative speeches at a conference titled
‘Azadi – The Only Way’ in October 2010.117

112Bashaarat Masood, ‘Kashmiri journalist Asif Sultan, who remained behind bars despite
court relief gets bail’, The Indian Express, May 15, 2024; Scroll Staff, ‘Two days after his
release from jail, Kashmiri journalist Asif Sultan arrested in UAPA case’, Scroll.in, March 1,
2024.

Scroll Staff, ‘J&K High Court quashes detention of journalist Asif Sultan’, December 12,
113

2023.

114KT News Service, ‘A Day After Release, Kashmiri Journalist Asif Sultan Re-Arrested in
Srinagar’, March 1, 2024.

NL Team, ‘Kashmir journalist Asif Sultan gets bail over two months after re-arrest under
115

PSA’, newslaundry, May 15, 2024.

Scroll Staff, ‘Kashmiri journalist Asif Sultan granted bail in five-year-old UAPA case’,
116

Scroll.in, May 15, 2024.

The Wire Staff, ‘Delhi LG Grants Sanction to Prosecute Arundathi Roy Under UAPA in
117

2010 Case’, The Wire, June 14, 2024.

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Court Rulings regarding the UAPA and PSA

Following a series of remarks by Chief Justice of India D.Y. Chandrachud, on
the need for judges to apply their minds when ruling on bail, especially given
that district court judges might fear targeting if they granted it, a spate of
rulings indicate that the Jammu and Kashmir High Court is taking a tougher
position with the administration on cases under the UAPA and PSA.118

In addition to the November and December 2023 and May 2024 orders in
the cases of Fahad Shah and Asif Sultan, at least five other rulings in four
months suggest the court is no longer willing to give the police rein on misuse
of draconian legislation. In April 2024, the court quashed detention for Jaffar
Ahmad Parray, booked under the PSA as a “hardcore OGW [Over Ground
Worker]” of the Lashkar-e-Taiba and Hizbul Mujahadeen. Noting that the
district magistrate's grounds for detention was a verbatim reproduction of
the police dossier, Justice Rahul Bharti ordered Parray’s immediate release,
saying India is not a police state.119

In the same month, Justice Bharti upheld a plea for compensation for illegal
detention filed by the spokesman of the banned Jamaat-e-Islami Kashmir.
Advocate Zahid Ali had been detained under the PSA and released by the
court four times between 2019 and 2024, suffering incarceration for over
1,080 days. While Ali had sought compensation for ₹25 lakh, Bharti ordered
the Jammu and Kashmir administration to pay ₹5 lakh. This was the first

118ANI, ‘Judges at grassroots reluctant to grant bail for fear of being targeted: CJI DY
Chandrachud’, The Economic Times, November 21, 2022; Livelaw News Network, ‘District
Judiciary Fearful About Granting Bail To Undertrials Due To Subordination Culture B/W
HCs & District Judges: CJI DY Chandrachud’, Livelaw.in, February 17, 2024; N. V.
Ramana, Criminal Appeal No. 649 of 2022 (Arising out of SLP (CRL.) No. 7893 of 2021),
Ms. Y Versus State of Rajasthan and Anr.,
https://main.sci.gov.in/supremecourt/2021/23304/23304_2021_1_1501_35038_Judge
ment_19-Apr-2022.pdf.

Scroll Staff, ‘’India not a police state’: J&K High Court quashes man’s detention under
119

Public Safety Act’, Scroll.in, April 16, 2024.

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time that the state was ordered to pay compensation to someone detained
under the PSA.120

In May 2024, the court issued a bail order for Khursheed Ahmad Lone, who
had been arrested under the UAPA for ‘influencing youngsters to take to the
path of terrorism and wage a war against the Union of India.’ Quoting
Voltaire, Justice Sreedharan noted, ‘Beware of the words “internal security”,
for they are the eternal cry of the oppressor.’ The court found that while the
administration spoke of national security, radical Islamism and allegiance to
Pakistan it had not provided sufficient material to make out a prima facie
case. Security concerns were in danger of being used as a ruse to divert from
the facts of the case.121

In July, Justice Bharti nullified a preventive detention order under the PSA
for failing to make out the case that a man accused of crimes such as theft,
kidnapping and drug trafficking threatened the security of the state.122 A few
days later, Justice Sanjay Dhar quashed three preventive detention orders:
the first on grounds that the detenu had not been supplied documents
pertaining to his arrest, the second on grounds that the charges were vague,
and the third on the grounds that the detenu’s plea for dropping of charges
had not been considered for an unreasonably long time. 123

In July 2024, however, Chief Justice N Kotiswar Singh and Justice Moksha
Khajuria struck down an appeal against detention under the PSA though the
detenu’s father alleged he had not been provided essential documents,
including a first information report or witness statements.124 Justice
Kotiswar Singh has subsequently been elevated to the Supreme Court.

120Bashaarat Masood, ‘In a first, Jammu and Kashmir High Court orders Rs 5-lakh relief
for man ‘illegally detained’ under the Public Safety Act’, The Indian Express, April 27,
2024.

121 Scroll Staff, ‘Government relying on ‘copy-paste’ arguments to oppose bail in UAPA
cases: Jammu and Kashmir HC’, Scroll.in, June 1, 2024.
122 KO Web Desk, ‘”Security of State” No Longer Valid Ground For Preventive Detention:

HC’, Kashmir Observer, June 8, 2024; Muzaffar Raina, ‘J&K and Ladakh HC invalidates
“security of state” as ground for detaining people under PSA’, The Telegraph, June 20,
2024.

123 M. Ahmad, ‘J&K HC Quashes 3 PSA Detention Orders’, Kashmir Observer, July 8, 2024.
124Scroll Staff. ‘Jammu and Kashmir: “Security of state” is valid grounds to detain person
in Union territory, says HC’, Scroll.in, July 9, 2024.
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Custodial deaths and torture

On December 22, 2023, after four Indian soldiers were killed and three
others were wounded in a terror attack the previous day, soldiers of the 48
Rashtriya Rifles took 25 men into custody from five villages in Rajouri and
Poonch: Topa Peer, Hasploot, Panghai, Sawani Mahra and Sangalini. 125
Mostly from the Gujjar and Bakkerwal communities, the men were allegedly
tortured at three different army bases: Mastandra army post, Dera Ki Gali
and Bafliaz.

Nine of the men were from Topa Peer: Safeer Ahmed, Shabir Ahmed,
Mohammad Showkat, Lal Hussain, Riyaz Ahmed, Farooq Ahmed, Jameel
Ahmed, Irfaan Ahmed and Israel.126 They were taken to the Mastandra army
post where, they said, they were beaten with lathis and metal pipes, dunked
in water and electrocuted; they also had chilli powder dropped in their eyes.
Irfaan Ahmed, recalling the experience, said, ‘I pleaded with them in the
name of Allah, but the man hitting me only smiled, taking out a knife and
saying, “This is to gouge your eyes with.’”127 Farooq Ahmed had previously
lost family members due to militant attacks: ‘I lost my brother, uncle and
sister-in-law to militants in the past. I fail to understand why we were picked
up this time.’128

Three of the nine men detained from Topa Pir were killed by water-dunking
and electrocution – Safeer and Shabir Ahmed and Mohammad Showkat.
Mohammad died in the presence of his wife, Fatima, who was pregnant. 129
The families of Safeer and Shabir were only allowed to see their bodies after

The Wire Staff, ‘Five Army Soldiers Killed in Anti-Militancy Operation in J&K’s Poonch’,
125

The Wire, December 22, 2023.

Jatinder Kaur Tur, ‘Screams from the Army Post: The Indian Army’s torture and
126

murder of civilians in a restive Jammu’, The Caravan, February 1, 2024, 50-54.

127 Ibid., 51.

Peerzada Ashiq, ‘We were beaten throughout the day, says J&K civilian’, The Hindu,
128

December 26, 2023.

129Safwat Zargar, ‘”They died in front of my eyes”: Eyewitness recounts torture of Poonch
Villagers in Army Custody’, Scroll.in, December 31, 2023.

35
 CIVILIAN SECURITY
the post-mortem, despite legal requirements to the contrary. The families
also refused to accept their relatives’ bodies until the survivors were taken to
hospital; by this point, it was the next day.130

Five of the 25 taken into custody were from Hasploot: Mohammad Ashraf,
Mohammad Farooq, Mohammad Zulfqar, Mohammad Betab and an
unnamed other. They were taken to Dera ki Gali, where they were beaten
with lathis and rods and had chilli powder rubbed into their wounds and
anuses.131 Their torture was videoed by a trooper. Betab, speaking at a
hospital after the incident, said, ‘There is no skin left on my upper body.’ 132

Nine men from Sawani Mahra and two from Sangalini villages were taken to
the Bafliaz base. They included a minor and an old man with a hearing
impairment. At the base, they were dunked in water, electrocuted and
beaten. When the troops released them close to their villages, Nisar recalled
being told, ‘Die if you want to at home, but don’t go out.’133 They left their
villages only after dark to seek medical help.

The army inquiry that followed found serious lapses in the conduct of 7 to 8
personnel at various levels. Disciplinary action was recommended against
two Junior Commissioned Officers (JCOs) and other ranks present during
the interrogation. Administrative action was also recommended against the
Brigade Commander, who appeared to have full knowledge of the torture.
Reportedly, the inquiry also acknowledged that the three men who died were
tortured.134

The families of the men killed were given ₹1 million each in compensation by
the army, which has also given varying amounts of compensation for those

Jatinder Kaur Tur, ‘Screams from the Army Post: The Indian Army’s torture and
130

murder of civilians in a restive Jammu’, The Caravan, February 1, 2024, 50-54.

131 Ibid., 54-56.

132 Arun Sharma, ‘Civilian “tortured” in Poonch speaks: “I am in video… they rubbed chilli
powder on our wounds”’, The Indian Express, December 25, 2023.
133 Jatinder Kaur Tur, ‘Screams from the Army Post: The Indian Army’s torture and

murder of civilians in a restive Jammu’, The Caravan, February 1, 2024, 56.

Amrita Nayak Dutta, ‘Army probes point to torture, death of 3 men from Poonch during
134

questioning’, The Indian Express, April 5, 2024.

36
CIVILIAN SECURITY

injured. Further compensation was supposedly awarded by the Jammu and

Kashmir administration. As of April 2024, only one of the survivors has been
able to go back to work. Many were the only earning members of their
families.135

The Rashtriya Rifles have been involved repeatedly in cases of custodial

torture and extrajudicial deaths. Clearly, root and branch reform is required,
but whether the Defence Ministry will prioritize it remains to be seen.

Two cases of death in police custody were also reported. In February 2024, a
man identified as Sahil Saini died in custody of the police in Jammu. Two
police personnel were suspended, given the mysterious circumstances of the
death.136

In June 2024, Imtiyaz Ahmad Palla was arrested by the Jammu and Kashmir
police in the Pulwama district for allegedly ‘selling/transporting narcotic
drugs.’ A day after being arrested, he was taken to the hospital as his health
had deteriorated. He was declared dead by the hospital doctors. Palla’s family
alleged that he had been tortured.137 Ghulam Hassan, Palla’s father-in-law,
said ‘Our martyr’s underclothes and trouser were smeared with blood and
chilli powder… (there was) a deep pit in his head. His genitals were injured
badly.’138

Censorship and propaganda

In September 2023, the Jammu and Kashmir administration blocked a story
on the stifling of journalism in Kashmir published online by the BBC; the
Jammu and Kashmir State Investigative Agency further added that they

135Arun Sharma, ‘Of 10 who survived Poonch torture, only one back at work, most yet to
recover’, The Indian Express, April 5, 2024.

136Observer News Service, ‘Custodial Death in Jammu: Two Cops Suspended, SHO
Attached’, Kashmir Observer, February 2, 2024.

Scroll Staff, ‘J&K: Man arrested for carrying alleged narcotic substance dies in police
137

custody, family seeks probe’, Scroll.in, June 5, 2024.

The Wire Staff, ‘”Framed in Drug Case”: Family of Pulwama Man Who Died in Police
138

Custody Alleges Torture’, The Wire, June 7, 2024.

37
 CIVILIAN SECURITY
reserved the right to initiate further legal action. 139 In February 2024, the
Ministry of Information and Broadcasting ordered the takedown of a story
on the ‘Indian Army’s torture and murder of civilians in a restive Jammu’ by
Jatinder Kaur Tur, published in The Caravan’s special issue on ‘The Military
Under Modi.’140 But there was no restriction on the sale of the magazine,
although the print edition contained the article.

There have also been reports of the Indian army being involved with
inauthentic accounts on social media. It is alleged that the army’s Chinar
Corps runs numerous fake accounts with Kashmiri names that praise the
Indian army. These accounts have also been involved in smear campaigns
against Kashmiri journalists.141

Use of Pegasus spyware against political leaders and

restrictions on their activities
In July 2024, former chief minister Mehbooba Mufti and her daughter Iltija
Mufti received messages from Apple that their phones were targets of the
Pegasus spyware.142

In the same month, Kashmiri political leaders were prevented from going to
the Martyr’s Graveyard to commemorate July 13, the date in 1931 on which
the maharaja’s troops fired upon Kashmiri protesters.143

Impact of absence of human rights and women’s commissions

In July 2024, while replying on a public interest litigation (PIL) seeking the
functionalization of statutory bodies in Jammu and Kashmir, Solicitor-

139Jehangir Ali, ‘J&K Police Threatens Legal Action Against BBC Over Report on Press
Freedom in Kashmir’, The Wire, September 2, 2023.

140NL Team, ‘MIB directs The Caravan to take down story on army’s ‘torture, murder of
civilians’ in Jammu’, newslaundry, February 13, 2024.

Shakir Mir, ‘Report Details How Army Used Fake Accounts to Target Kashmiri
141

Journalists, Promote Narrative’, The Wire, September 29, 2023.

142Express News Service, ‘Mehbooba’s daughter among Apple users in 98 countries to

receive alert on ‘mercenary spyware’, The Indian Express, July 11, 2024.

PTI, ‘Kashmir 'Martyrs Day': Mehbooba Mufti, other political leaders claim they are
143

under 'house arrest'’, Greater Kashmir, July 13, 2024.

38
CIVILIAN SECURITY

General Tushar Mehta informed a Supreme Court bench comprising the

Chief Justice and Justice J.B. Pardiwala that the duties of the former state
commissions were undertaken by their national counterparts after 2019.
Accepting his submission, the bench dismissed the PIL.144

Unfortunately, however, the national commissions have not acted as

substitutes for the state commissions. The National Human Rights
Commission (NHRC) has not taken notice of the custodial torture and deaths
in December 2023 or sought stringent action. It announced public hearings
would be held on human rights violations in February 2024, but the hearings
were postponed indefinitely. There is no information on action taken on the
1,164 cases from Jammu and Kashmir registered with the NHRC between
October 2019-December 2022, nor on the 765 complaints that were pending
with the state human rights commission when it was wound up following the
2019 Reorganization Act. According to victim families, the Jammu and
Kashmir human rights commission’s rulings made just before it was wound
up have not been implemented.145 Nor has the NHRC enquired into the use
of the UAPA and PSA against journalists, lawyers, students and other
members of civil society.
The National Commission for Women (NCW) has outsourced its duties in
Jammu and Kashmir to the Tata Institute for Social Sciences (TISS).
Following complaints of lack of access to redress after the Jammu and
Kashmir women’s commission was wound up, the NCW contracted the TISS
to set up special cells in the two Union Territories’ police forces to provide
‘social services to women survivors by trained social workers located in a
police system with a clear understanding that violence against women is a
crime.’ The initial twelve cells were expanded to 22 in 2023: 10 in Jammu,
10 in Kashmir and 2 in Ladakh.

According to the NCW’s annual report for 2022-2023, the 10 special cells set
up in Jammu and Kashmir in 2021 assisted 2,836 survivors of domestic

Anmol Kaur Bawa, ‘J&K Will Come Under NHRC; All Other Statutory Commissions
144

Restored There: Union Tells Supreme Court’, Livelaw.in, 9 July 2024.

Tarushi Aswani, ‘Five Years Since J&K Government Shut Down J&K Human Rights
145

Commission, Victim Families Await Justice’, The Wire, May 31, 2024.

39
violence between 2021-2023 (of which 1,573 were one-time interventions);
the two cells set up in Ladakh assisted 197. 146

Since no report for 2023-2024 is available as of this writing, we do not know

how the 10 new cells are working. But in July 2024, a complaint of domestic
abuse was filed with the lieutenant-governor’s grievance cell; the survivor,
she said, had lost faith in the police. She had filed a complaint with the local
police in June and her husband was arrested; however, the court gave him
bail.147 No information is available on what action has been taken by the
lieutenant-governor’s grievance cell.

Moreover, while stationing social workers in police cells may be a good on its
own, it is no substitute for an office manned by women’s rights advocates:
the former is alienating, the latter should be reassuring.

146National Commission for Women, Annual Report 2022-2023, 54,

https://ncwapps.nic.in/pdfReports/AnnualReport2022_2023_Eng.pdf.

Majid Nabi, ‘Domestic Violence: Woman Lodges Complaint with LG Grievance Cell”, Kashmir
147

Observer, July 8, 2024.

40
 DEVELOPMENT
ECONOMIC AND HUMAN DEVELOPMENT

According to the Economic Survey 2023-2024, Jammu and Kashmir’s

economy is yet to recover to its state pre-2019. Between April 2015-March
2019, the state’s net domestic product (NSDP) grew at an average of 13.28
percent (including Ladakh); after it became a Union Territory (excluding
Ladakh), the NSDP growth rate averaged 8.73 percent. Similarly, the per
capita NSDP growth rate was 12.31 percent between April 2015-March 2019;
it was 8.41 percent between April 2019-March 2024.148 Even discounting the
loss years of 2016-2017 (intense stone-pelting agitations), 2019-2020
(lockdown to prevent protest against the removal of special status and the
Reorganization Act), and 2020-2021 (Covid-19 lockdowns), the pre-2019
NSDP and per capita NSDP growth rates were better than post-2019, the
former at 15.61 per cent against 13.79 percent, and the latter at 14.63 percent
against 12.97 percent.
Though the labour force participation rate for 2023-2024 was higher than
the all-India average (39.2 percent: 36.2 percent), the worker to population
ratio was lower (35 percent: 36.4 percent). The unemployment rate in 2023-
2024 was considerably higher than the national average at 10.7 percent
compared to 6.6 percent.149
In successive reports, the Forum had documented how new rules regarding
land lease and/or ownership, forest rights, first options on mining and cross-
border trade, to name but a few, have disempowered local industry in favour
of national companies.150 Notably, despite receiving investment proposals

148Department of Economic Affairs, Government of India, Economic Survey 2023-24:

Statistical Appendix, Table 1.10B: Growth of Net State Domestic Product At Current Prices
(2011-12 Series) As on 15.03.2024 (per cent), 31; Table 1.11B: Growth of Per Capita Net State
Domestic Product at Current Prices (2011-12 Series) As on 15.03.2024 (per cent), 33.

149Ibid, Table 8.10: Labour Force Participation Rate (LFPR) (persons, all ages) (in per cent)
according to current weekly status for different States, 188-189; Table 8.11: Worker
Population Rate (WPR) (in per cent) according to current weekly status for different States
(persons, all ages), 190; Table 8.12: Unemployment Rate (UR) (in per cent) according to
current weekly status for different States (For persons, All ages), 191.

The Forum for Human Rights in Jammu and Kashmir, Forum for Human Rights in
150

Jammu and Kashmir: Forum’s Mid-Term Report: August 2020 to January 2021; The
Forum for Human Rights in Jammu and Kashmir, Five Years Without an Elected
Administration: Human Rights in Jammu and Kashmir, August 2022 to July 2023.
41
DEVELOPMENT

worth ₹90,182 crores between 2019-2023, the actual investment cleared was
₹5,319 crores.151

New losses in the fruit industry

Fresh complaints from the fruit industry include the Union Finance
Ministry’s cuts in import duties on walnuts and apples by 20 percent.152 As a
result, lower-priced walnuts are now being imported from China, Turkey and
the United States, further impacting Kashmiri walnut farmers, whose prices
are higher due to the cost of labour and lack of irrigation facilities.
Similarly, the ministry’s slashing of the import duty on Washington apples
from 70 to 50 per cent has constituted a further setback for apple growers.
Around 35 lakh people grow apples, contributing to 90 per cent of the total
fruit production and 40 per cent of fruit cultivation land in Jammu and
Kashmir.153 Adding to the problems of the apple growers, there has been a
lack of snowfall and rainfall in the past year, leading to crop quality and yield
problems.154 Unseasonal hailstorms caused further damage to orchards.155
Their problems are further compounded by the administration’s land
acquisition policies, currently for an all-weather railway line. According to
one farmer, Muhammad Shafi, the officials who surveyed his land informed
him that the railway line was to cater to the Amarnath pilgrimage. However,
Altaf Thakur, a BJP spokesman for the region, denied this claim, saying the
railway will be used by all people.156

KL News Network, ‘JK Budget 2024: Investment Proposals Worth Rs 90,182 Crore
151

Received, KashmirLife.net, February 4, 2024.

PTI, ‘Basic customs duties on 8 US products will continue; only retaliatory tax removed’,
152

The Economic Times, September 15, 2023.

153Editorial Board, ‘Protecting Kashmiri Fruits and Nuts’, Kashmir Observer, September 7,
2023; Arjumand Shaheen and Basit Parray, ‘Kashmir’s apple orchards, millions of jobs,
face threat from rail line’, Al Jazeera, April 10, 2024.

Shambhavi Anand, ‘No snow in Kashmir, Himachal can damage apples: Growers’, The
154

Economic Times, January 24, 2024.

KNO, ‘Hailstorm Causes Widespread Damage to Kashmir Orchards, Say Growers’,

155

Kashmir Observer, October 16, 2023.

156Arjumand Shaheen and Basit Parray, ‘Kashmir’s apple orchards, millions of jobs, face
threat from rail line’, Al Jazeera, April 10, 2024.
42
 DEVELOPMENT
Saffron cultivation, too, has been significantly affected. While 8 tonnes of
saffron were produced in 2010-2011, in 2023-2024, only 2.6 tonnes have
been produced, a 67.5 percent decrease. The cultivation area has fallen, too,
from 5,707 hectares of land in 1996-1997 to 3,715 hectares today. Saffron is a
moisture-sensitive crop, and the region has experienced a prolonged dry
season, which is compounded by a lack of proper irrigation systems.
Kashmiri saffron has also faced competition from Iranian saffron, which is
imported tax free despite the higher quality of Kashmiri saffron. 157
Human development deficits
According to the UNDP’s Human Development Index, Kashmir’s human
development fell from 0.712 to 0.699 in 2021 158; no figures are available for
2022 and 2023. NITI Aayog’s annual reports on India’s performance on the
Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) show that Jammu and Kashmir had
fallen to the worst-performing Union Territory in 2019-2020, with a score of
59 on 100—on par with Ladakh—while the India score was 60. According to
the 2023-2024 report, Jammu and Kashmir now scores at 74, slightly above
the all-India score of 71.159

The Niti Aayog’s SDG Index, which is prepared in collaboration with the
UNDP, has been widely criticised for both its methodology and its data
sources.160 Some of its scores are certainly bewildering. Thus, for example, it
gives Jammu and Kashmir 81 on SDG-16 – peace, justice and strong
institutions – for 2023-2024, up from 69 in the base year of 2018 as well as
the reference year of 2019-2020. How can such a high score be awarded to a
region which has not had an elected administration or legislature for six

157Auqib Javeed, ‘Kashmir’s famed saffron fields are under siege’, Frontline, May 2, 2024,
https://frontline.thehindu.com/environment/kashmir-saffron-under-siege-prolonged-
dry-spell-rodents-cement-dust-influx-of-iranian-imports/article68082291.ece.

158 Global Data Lab, Subnational HDI, https://globaldatalab.org/shdi/table/shdi/IND/.

159NITI Aayog, ‘SDG India Index 2023-24: Towards Viksit Bharat Sustainable Progress,
Inclusive Growth’, 269.

160Aathira Perichery, Climate Action, and Also Contradictions: Niti Aayog’s SDG India
Index 2024 Report is a Mixed Bag‘, The Wire, July 19, 2024; Deepanshu Mohan and
Centre for New Economic Studies, ‘NiTi Aayog ‘Poverty’ Stats: Serious Theoretical,
Methodological, Empirical Questions’, The Wire, January 18, 2024; Asian Centre for
Human Rights, ‘NORTH EAST SDG INDEX 2021-2022 FLAWED: Changlang District An
‘Aspriant’, Not ‘Front Runner’ In Ranking’. ACHR Briefing Paper, February 2022.

43
DEVELOPMENT

years, whose oversight and accountability institutions are closed, which

frequently resorts to the use of draconian legislation to suppress dissent, and
which continues to be gripped by armed conflict?
The score is especially puzzling given that the available data on the Niti
Aayog’s selection of 5 out of 12 UN SDG-16 targets to measure Jammu and
Kashmir’s progress on the goal – 16.1: Significantly reduce all forms of
violence and related death rates everywhere, 16.2: End abuse, exploitation,
trafficking and all forms of violence against and torture of children, 16.3:
Promote the rule of law at the national and international levels and ensure
equal access to justice for all, 16.5: Substantially reduce corruption and
bribery in all their forms, 16.9: By 2030, provide legal identity for all,
including birth registration – as this report indicates, shows stasis at best and
deterioration at worst. Moreover, critical targets have not been included,
such as 16.6: Develop effective, accountable, and transparent institutions at
all levels, 16.7: Ensure responsive, inclusive, participatory and representative
decision-making at all levels, and 16.10: Ensure public access to information
and protect fundamental freedoms, in accordance with national legislation
and international agreements.161
Even within each target that it has chosen, the Niti Aayog has been selective
with indicators. For example, of four indicators listed to measure progress
on target 16.1, it has chosen only the first, relating to murders per 100,000
of the population. An equally if not more relevant indicator, of the number of
conflict-related deaths (16.1.2), has been omitted, as has another dealing
with the proportion of people who feel safe walking around (16.1.4).162
The indicators used to measure progress have also changed from report to
report. Take, for example, SDG 5: Gender equality. In the 2019-2020 report,
‘Sexual crimes against girl children’ is listed as an indicator; this is dropped
in subsequent reports. Similarly, the 2019-2020 and 2020-2021 reports
included the indicator ‘Crimes against women per 100,000 female
population’, but this was dropped in the 2023-2024 report. The sex ratio
statistics, too, see a change in data sources. In 2019-2020 and 2020-2021,
the data source used was the Ministry of Home Affairs’ (Office of the

UN Department of Economic and Social Affairs, Sustainable Development: The 17

161

Goals, https://sdgs.un.org/goals.

162SDG 16 Hub, SDG Indicators, https://www.sdg16hub.org/landing-page/sdg-16-

indicators.

44
 DEVELOPMENT
Registrar General of India) Sample Registration System, but in 2023-2024 it
was the Ministry of Health and Family Welfare’s National Family Health
Survey. The result is that the reports suggest an increase in the sex ratio from
917 in 2019-2020 to 976 in 2023-202, a statistically impossible rise in the
fertility rate over five years.163
Leaving criticism aside, the index shows little improvement on key goals such
as SDG-1 (no poverty), which was awarded 61 on 100 in 2018, fell to 58 in
2019-2020 and rose to 64 in 2023-2024. Gender equality (SDG-5)
surprisingly jumped from 33 in 2018 to 53 in 2019-2020 – was there more
equality under the lockdown? – and remained at that relatively low level in
2023-2024. Environmental protections, including forest cover, fell from 74
in 2018 to 61 in 2023-2024. Quality education, which was a low 51 in 2018,
was a low 55 in 2023-2024.164
Similarly, while child mortality rates (under five, per 1,000 live births) have
dropped from 38 to 17 between 2019-2024, the proportion of pregnant
women who are anaemic has risen from 38.1 percent between 2018- 2020 to
44.1 percent in 2023-2024. Suicide rates have gone up from 2.10 per
1,00,000 in 2020 to 2.40 in 2023-2024. The literacy rate (>15 years) has
fallen from 76.4 percent in 2020 to 74.40 percent in 2023-24. On the plus
side, the average annual dropout rate at the secondary level (Class IX and X)
has also declined from 17.81 per cent to 6 per cent over the same period.165
Suicide and depression
It is estimated that 55.72 per cent of the Jammu and Kashmir population
suffer from depression, with the highest numbers being young people
between the ages of 15-35. In rural areas, female depression rates were

NITI Aayog, ‘SDG India Index & Dashboard: 2019-20’; NITI Aayog, ‘SDG India Index &
163

Dashboard 2020-21: Partnerships in the Decade of Action’; NITI Aayog, ‘SDG India Index
2023-24: Towards Viksit Bharat Sustainable Progress, Inclusive Growth.’

164UNDP and Niti Aayog, SDG India Index: Baseline Report, 2018, p. 10;
https://www.niti.gov.in/sites/default/files/2020-
07/SDX_Index_India_Baseline_Report_21-12-2018.pdf; SDG Index and Dashboard
2019-2020, , 291, https://pminewyork.gov.in/pdf/menu/SDGIndia_Dec2.pdf; SDG India
Index, 2023-2024, https://www.niti.gov.in/sites/default/files/2024-
07/SDG_India_Index_2023-24.pdf.

165NITI Aayog, ‘SDG India Index 2023-24: Towards Viksit Bharat Sustainable Progress,
Inclusive Growth’, 269.

45
DEVELOPMENT

estimated to be around 93.10 percent as compared to males at 6.8 percent.166

According to official statistics, 53.97 percent of emergency callers to the
National Tele Mental Health Programme-J&K were women.167

In 2022, Jammu and Kashmir saw the highest attempted suicide rate in the
country: nearly 30 per cent of the total (497 out of 1769). Post the vitiation
Article 370 and the Covid-19 pandemic, the suicide rate rose steadily between
2019-2021. The most common methods of committing suicide are either
drug overdoses or drowning, leaving little room for intervention. 168 Of the
total 26,477 calls that were made from November 2022 to October 2023 to
the Tele Mental Health Programme, 799 were related to attempted suicide or
suicidal impulses.169 16 students from Jammu and Kashmir studying
elsewhere have committed suicide since 2016.170

The mental health infrastructure is extremely weak. There are 41

psychiatrists in a state of 12.5 million, and most of them are concentrated in
Srinagar and Jammu cities. Only 5 or 6 psychiatrists work at the district
level.171

166 News Desk, ‘Mental health issues in Kashmir higher than global average’, The
Kashmiriyat, October 11, 2023.
167 Peerzada Ashiq, ‘With record number of calls, J&K programme for mental health

declared top-ranking initiative among UTs’, The Hindu, October 13, 2023.

Raashid Andrabi, ‘Why Jammu and Kashmir saw the highest suicide rate in India in
168

2022’, Frontline, February 15, 2024.

Fayaz Wani, ‘Battling stress: 27k distress calls in 10 months in J&K’, The New Indian
169

Express, October 12, 2023.

170Majid Nabi, ’16 Students Studying Outside J&K Take Own Lives Since 2016’, Kashmir
Observer, March 19, 2024, https://kashmirobserver.net/2024/03/19/16-students-
studying-outside-jk-take-own-lives-since-2016/.

171Sheikh Shoib and S. M. Yasir Arafat, ‘Mental health in Kashmir: conflict to COVID-19’,
Public Health, September 11, 2020,
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7484691/.

46
 RIGHTS VIOLATIONS
RIGHTS VIOLATIONS
1-3 Right to representation, right to regular, free and fair
elections, right to vote.
Sections 14 and 15 of the Representation of Peoples Act, 1951, read with
Articles 325 and 326 of the Indian constitution, and Article 52 of the now
nullified Jammu and Kashmir constitution, specify the right to regular, free
and fair elections. The right to vote has also been recognised as a
constitutional right associated with the freedom of expression under Article
21(a) of the Indian constitution, since a vote involves expressing the choice
of political candidate.

Successive Supreme Court judgements have held that ‘democracy is a basic

feature of the constitution and elections conducted at regular prescribed
intervals are essential to the democratic system envisaged in the
constitution. So is the need to protect and sustain the purity of the electoral
process.’ (Kihoto Hollohon, AIR 1993 SC 412). Again, in the same case,
Verma, J., declared in his minority opinion: ‘democracy is a part of the basic
structure of our Constitution; and the rule of law, and free and fair elections,
are basic features of democracy.’ The Supreme Court has also emphasized
the Election Commission’s duty to conduct free and fair elections.

Article 21(3) of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, 1948, to which

India is a signatory, states that the will of the people shall be expressed in
periodic and genuine elections, and Article 25(b) of the International
Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, 1966 lists the right to vote and be
elected at genuine periodic elections, guaranteeing the free expression of the
will of the electors.

4-11 Right to habeas corpus, right to live in peace, right to

protection against arbitrary arrest, illegal and/or preventive
detention, custodial violence and injury, right to bail and right to
fair and speedy trial.
The Constitution of India, Article 21: No person shall be deprived of his life
or personal liberty except according to a procedure established by law.
Jurisprudence includes: Habeas corpus (Maneka Gandhi v Union of India,
Sunil Batra v Delhi Administration, Francis Coralie Mullin v
Administrator, Union Territory of Delhi and Others); Protection from injury
(Kharak Singh v State of Uttar Pradesh); Right against illegal detention

47
RIGHTS VIOLATIONS

(Joginder Kumar v State of Uttar Pradesh, D.K. Basu v State of West

Bengal); Right to bail (Sheikh Javed Iqbal v State of Uttar Pradesh, Babu
Singh v State of Uttar Pradesh); Right to speedy trial (Hussainara Khatoon
v Home Secretary, State of Bihar, A.R. Antulay v R.S. Nayak, Anil Rai v
State of Bihar, Zahira Habibullah Sheikh v State of Gujarat).

The Constitution of India, Articles 22(4) and 22(5). Protection against arrest
and detention in certain cases: Preventive detention must be no more than
three months unless an Advisory Board comprising High Court judges or
their equivalent determines that there is sufficient cause for extension of the
detention period. Detainees should be given the earliest opportunity of
making a representation against the order.

The Universal Declaration of Human Rights, 1948 (to which India is a party),
Article 8: right to an effective legal remedy; Article 9: protection against
arbitrary arrest, detention or exile; and Article 10: fair and public hearing.

The International Covenant for Civil and Political Rights, 1966 (to which
India is a party), specifies pre-trial detention only for narrow purposes such
as to ‘prevent flight, interference with evidence, or the recurrence of the
crime’. The Working Group on Arbitrary Detention of the UN Human Rights
Council (of which India is a member) states that ‘any detention must be
exceptional and of short duration and a release may be accompanied by
measures intended only to ensure representation of the defendant in judicial
proceedings.’

The UN Rules for the Treatment of Women Prisoners and Non-Custodial

Measures for Women Offenders, adopted by the UN General Assembly in
2010, specifies that noncustodial means should be preferred for pregnant
women during the pre-trial phase wherever that is possible or appropriate.

12-13 Women’s rights to protection against violence and sexual

harassment, access to women’s police stations.
The National Policy on the Empowerment of Women, adopted in 2001,
stressed the importance of tackling violence against women using
operational strategy, such as, ‘…para 13.3 (d) Women’s Cells in Police
Stations, Women Police Stations, Family Courts, Mahila Courts, Family
Counselling Centres, Legal Aid and Nyaya Panchayats will be strengthened
and expanded to eliminate violence and atrocities against women.’ This

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infrastructure is to implement rights under the Protection of Women from
Domestic Violence Act, 2005, and The Sexual Harassment of Women at
Workplace (Prevention, Prohibition And Redressal) Act, 2013, but has not
been put in place by the Jammu and Kashmir administration.

The UN Declaration on the Elimination of Violence Against Women, 1993,

Article 4, obliges states to prevent and punish acts of violence against women.
The Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against
Women, 1979, also contains a similar set of rights, most prominently in
Article 5. India has ratified both of these conventions.

14-19 Protection of children from sexual offences, kidnapping

and or/abduction, protection against mental harassment,
making the child free of fear, trauma and anxiety and helping the
child to express views freely, protection of the rights of the child
by the National Commission for Protection of Child Rights.
The Constitution of India, Articles 21A and 45, and the Right of Children to
Free and Compulsory Education Act 2009, Sections 3(1), 17(1): making the
child free of fear, trauma and anxiety and helping the child to express views
freely, protection of the rights of the child by the National Commission for
Protection of Child Rights.

The kidnapping and/or abduction of a child are prohibited by The Child Act
1960, The Protection of Children from Sexual Offences Act, 2012, No. 32 of
2012, and sections 359-367 of the IPC, now S.137-140(3) of the Bhartiya
Nyaya Sanhita 2024 (kidnapping, abduction, ransom, maiming of children).
Jurisprudence: Sheela Barse v Union of India, Munna v State of U.P., Rajeev
Kumar v State of U.P. & Ors., Vinod Solanki v Union of India, Vikram Deo
Singh Tomar vs. State of Bihar, Salil Bali v Union of India, Tanvi Ahuja v
State of J&K and others.

20-21 Right to freedom of speech and expression, right to

peaceful assembly.
The Constitution of India, Article 19(1): All citizens shall have the right, (a)
to freedom of speech and expression; and (b) to assemble peaceably and
without arms. Article 19(2): any restriction on speech must have a proximate
connection with a specific head set out in the article and must show a real
and imminent risk of harm arising from the speech and not vague
speculation about possible future harms. Jurisprudence: Chintaman Rao

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RIGHTS VIOLATIONS

and Others v The State of Madhya Pradesh, Sakal Papers (P) Ltd., and
Others v Union of India, Shreya Singhal v Union of India, Subramanian
Swamy v Union of India.

The Universal Declaration of Human Rights, 1948, Article 19: right to

freedom of opinion and expression, including freedom to hold opinions
without interference and to seek, receive and impart information and ideas
through any media and regardless of frontiers.

The Universal Declaration of Human Rights, 1948, Article 20(1): right to

freedom of peaceful assembly and association.

22-25 Freedom of the press, right to know, right to publish,

freedom of circulation.
The Constitution of India, Article 21: the freedom of expression includes the
freedom of the press. Jurisprudence: Romesh Thapar v State of Madras,
Indian Express Newspapers v Union of India, Sakal Papers v Union of
India; The right to know: Reliance Petrochemicals. Ltd. v Proprietors Indian
Express Newspapers, Bombay Pvt. Ltd, Essar Oil Ltd. v Halar Utkarsh
Samit.

26-27 Right to work, right to livelihood.

The Constitution of India, Article 19(4(g)): the right to practise any
profession, or to carry on any occupation, trade or business.

The Constitution of India, Article 41: The State shall, within the limits of its
economic capacity and development make effective provision for securing
the right to work. Jurisprudence: State of Maharashtra v Shobha Vitthal
Kolte and Ors, Air India Statutory Corporation v United Labour Union &
Ors, M/S Zee Telefilms Ltd. & Anr v Union of India & Ors, Samir
Bhattacharya And Ors. v The State of West Bengal And Ors, Rishi Kumar v
State Of U.P. And Ors.

The Constitution of India, Article 21: the right to life includes the right to
livelihood. Jurisprudence: Delhi Development Horticulture Employees’
Union v Delhi Administration, Delhi and Ors..

The Constitution of India, Article 39(a): the right to an adequate means of

50
 RIGHTS VIOLATIONS
livelihood, the right not to be deprived of a livelihood. Jurisprudence: Olga
Tellis v Bombay Municipal Corporation.

Universal Declaration of Human Rights, 1948, Article 23(1): the right to

work, to free choice of employment, to just and favourable conditions of work
and to protection against unemployment; and Article 23(3): the right to just
and favourable remuneration.

International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights, 1966,

Article 1(2): All peoples may, for their own ends, freely dispose of their
natural wealth and resources without prejudice. In no case may a people be
deprived of its own means of subsistence); and Article 6(1): the right to work
includes the right of everyone to the opportunity to gain his living by work
which he freely chooses or accepts.

27-28 Rights to a clean environment and protected forests, rights

of indigenous and forest dwelling communities.
Article 48-A: The State shall endeavour to protect and improve the
environment and to safeguard the forests and wild life of the country.

The Scheduled Tribes and Other Traditional Forest Dwellers (Recognition of

Forest Rights) Act, 2006, vests tribal populations with the rights to
protection against forced displacement of forest dwelling communities,
grazing rights and access to forest resources and products. The act also
provides for the right to livelihood for tribal populations. Section 3 describes
the rights of forest-dwelling scheduled tribes and other traditional forest
dwellers to hold and inhabit forest land, use it for cultivation, collect and use
forest produce and products of water bodies.

The Supreme Court has held that the customary and cultural rights of tribal
populations, forest dwellers, and indigenous peoples are fundamental rights
under Articles 25 and 26 of the Indian constitution.

India is also signatory to the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of

Indigenous Peoples, 2007 (UNDRIP). Article 26 provides that indigenous
peoples have the rights to lands, territories, and resources that they have
traditionally used. Article 11 provides for the right of indigenous peoples to
practice their cultural traditions and customs.

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RIGHTS VIOLATIONS

29-30 Right to registration of complaints (FIR), right to

magisterial investigation in cases of alleged custodial deaths.
Section 174, CrPC, now S.194 of the Bhartiya Nagrik Suraksha Sanhita, 2024
(Police to enquire and report on suicide, etc). Since murder and causing
grievous injury are cognizable offences and the police cannot claim immunity
as of right, a report should be instituted by the police when family members
make a complaint, even if the police themselves have a different or conflicting
story. This issue acquires especial salience in the case of the death of Irfan
Dar, who family members allege was detained by the police and died in
custody, whereas the police claim he was found dead on account of cardiac
arrest. Section 174 of the CrpC mandates that such matters have to be
reported to the executive magistrate who is to hold an inquest to rule out foul
play.

31. Right to due process in arrests.

Section 41B of the CrPC, now S.36 of the Bhartiya Nagrik Suraksha Sanhita,
2024 (Procedure of arrest and duties of officer making arrest). The police are
obliged to prepare an arrest memo which has to be attested by a family
member and countersigned by the person arrested. If a family member is not
available, the arrested person has to be informed that s/he has the right to
have a relative informed of her/his arrest.

32-40 Principle of natural justice and the principle of a fresh

start, arrest only by a special juvenile police unit, detention only
in homes for juveniles, presumption of innocence, non-waiver of
rights, right to bail, right to privacy and confidentiality, aftercare
and rehabilitation, treatment of children in armed conflict.
The Juvenile Justice (Care and Protection) of Children Act 2015, section 3
(xvi), (i), (ix), (xi), which are based on the UN Convention on the Rights of
the Child, 1992 (to which India is a party), Articles 38, 39, 40 (1, 2, 3):
Principle of natural justice, presumption of innocence, non-waiver of rights,
right to privacy and confidentiality. Under section 8 of the act, the Juvenile
Justice Board is responsible for ensuring aftercare and rehabilitation.
Section 2 (14) (xi) of the act includes within the ambit of ‘child in need of care
and protection’, a child ‘who is victim of or affected by any armed conflict,
civil unrest or natural calamity’.

The Jammu and Kashmir Juvenile Justice (Care and Protection of Children)
Act, 2013, section 11(1), The Juvenile Justice (Care and Protection) of

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 RIGHTS VIOLATIONS
Children Act 2015, Chapter IV, sections 10(1) and 12(1): arrest (in heinous
offences) only by a special juvenile police unit, production before the juvenile
justice board within 24 hours, detention only in homes for juveniles, right to
bail.

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APPENDIX

APPENDIX
Brief Bios of members of The Forum for Human Rights in
alphabetical order

Enakshi Ganguly is a human rights activist, writer and researcher.

Beginning her career at the Indian Social Institute in 1985, she was Deputy
Director of the Multiple Action Research Group (MARG), worked with
Mobile Creches and the Population Council and co-founded the HAQ Centre
for Child Rights in 1998. She is currently advisor to HAQ and a freelance
consultant. She is the President of the Society for Rural, Urban Tribal
Initiatives (SRUTI) and on the boards of the Gender Centre of the Lal
Bahadur Shastri Academy for Administration (LBSNAA) and National
Centre for Advocacy Studies (NCAS). Ms. Ganguly was a member of the
Steering Committee of the Planning Commission for the Eleventh and
Twelfth Five Year Plans and a technical expert for several UN agencies. In
2003, she was awarded the Ashoka Fellowship and has been profiled in a
book entitled WOMANKIND: Faces of Change Around the World by Donna
Nebenzahl and Nance Ackerman (Raincoast Books: 2003). In 2019, she was
awarded the REX Karmaveer Chakra award instituted by iCONGO in
Partnership with the United Nations.

Ramachandra Guha is a historian and biographer based in Bengaluru. He

has taught at the universities of Yale and Stanford, held the Arné Naess Chair
at the University of Oslo, and served as the Philippe Roman Professor of
History and International Affairs at the London School of Economics. In
2019-20 he held the Satish Dhawan Chair in the humanities at the Indian
Institute of Science. Guha’s books include a pioneering environmental
history, The Unquiet Woods (University of California Press, 1989), an award-
winning social history of cricket, A Corner of a Foreign Field (Picador,
2002), and a best-selling history of independent India, India after Gandhi
(Macmillan/Ecco Press, 2007). His most recent work is a two-volume
biography of Mahatma Gandhi: Gandhi Before India (2013), and Gandhi:
The Years that Changed the World (2018).

Colonel (retd) Yoginder Kandhari was born and brought up in Kashmir

and remains intensely connected to the region. He regularly contributes
articles on it and other strategic and security issues in newspapers and
magazines. He served a tenure in Kashmir during the peak of militancy from

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 APPENDIX
1983 to 1987. Presently, he is involved in the preparatory work of a book
titled Revisiting Kashmir – 1989-90: Deconstructing the State Response.

Air Vice Marshal (retd) Kapil Kak served in the Indian Air Force in the
flying branch for over three decades and undertook combat missions in the
India-Pakistan War of 1971. For distinguished service of exceptional order’,
the President of India awarded him the Ati Vishist Seva Medal, as well as the
Vishist Seva Medal. A former Deputy Director at the Institute for Defence
Studies and Analyses in New Delhi, and Advisor (Strategic Studies) at the
University of Jammu, Air Marshal Kapil Kak is the Founding Additional
Director of the Centre for Air Power Studies, New Delhi, and is closely
associated with the Track II initiatives of multiple public policy think tanks
on the India-Pakistan peace process, and conflict resolution and peace
building in Jammu and Kashmir. He is on the Board of Directors of the New
Delhi-based Healing Minds Foundation.

Radha Kumar (co-chair) is former Director-General of the Delhi Policy

Group (2010-2015), specialising on peace and security. Earlier Director of
the Mandela Centre for Peace at Jamia Millia Islamia University, Dr. Kumar
was also Senior Fellow at the Council on Foreign Relations in New York. She
has served on the boards of the UN Institute for Training and Research
(UNITAR), the Foundation for Communal Harmony, the United Nations
University Council (which she chaired from 2016-19) and is currently a Board
member of the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (SIPRI).
She was a member of the three-person Group of Interlocutors for Jammu
and Kashmir appointed by the Government of India (2010-11), who prepared
the report titled A New Compact for Jammu and Kashmir. Her latest books
are The Republic Relearned: Renewing Indian Democracy, 1947-2024
(Penguin Vintage: 2024), and Paradise at War: A Political History of
Kashmir (Updated, Aleph: 2024).

Justice Madan Lokur graduated in law from Delhi University in 1977 and
joined the Bar immediately thereafter. He was appointed Additional Solicitor
General of Delhi in 1998 and judge of the Delhi High Court in 1999, and as
Chief Justice of the Gauhati High Court in 2009 and of the Andhra Pradesh
High Court in 2011. In June 2012, he was appointed judge of the Supreme
Court. After his retirement in December 2018, he was appointed judge of the
Supreme Court of Fiji in January 2019 and took the oath of office in August.
Justice Lokur’s expertise includes alternative dispute resolution mechanisms

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APPENDIX

(such as arbitration and mediation), legal aid, judicial education, child rights
and human rights.

Justice Hasnain Masoodi is a former judge of the High Court of Jammu

and Kashmir and was a member of the 17th Lok Sabha (the lower house of the
Indian parliament), from the Anantnag constituency of Jammu and
Kashmir.

Major General (retd.) Ashok Kumar Mehta retired from the Indian
army in 1991. He served in Uri, south of the Pir Panjal in Rajouri, and in the
Kargil and Ladakh sectors. He fought in the 1965 and 1971 India-Pakistan
wars, both in the eastern and western theatres of the conflict. He also
commanded the Indian Peace-Keeping Force in Sri Lanka, fought counter-
insurgency operations in Nagaland, and engaged in UN Peacekeeping
Operations in 1962-63. He returned to Jammu & Kashmir in 1988 as a
member of the Defence Planning Staff, Ministry of Defence. He has
subsequently visited Jammu and Kashmir after retirement in 1993 and in
mid-2000 as part of Track II assignments. In 2003, he became the convenor
of an annual India Pakistan conference which continued almost
uninterrupted till 2018.

Justice Bilal Nazki is a former Chief Justice of the High Court of Orissa
and has served as judge in the high courts of Jammu and Kashmir, Andhra
Pradesh and Bombay, and as Advocate General of Jammu and Kashmir. He
was Chairman of the Jammu and Kashmir State Human Rights Commission
and the Human Rights Commission of Bihar and headed the committee set
up by the Government of India to review the functioning of the Haj
Committee of India and its state units. He has been President of the Andhra
Pradesh State Judicial Academy, Chancellor of National Academy of Legal
Studies & Research University (NALSAR), Hyderabad, and Executive
Chairman of the Andhra Pradesh State Legal Services Authority.

Justice Ruma Pal is a former judge of the Supreme Court of India (2000-
2006) as well as of the Calcutta High Court. She has served as Chancellor of
Sikkim University, Executive Council member of the International Academy
of Law, Executive Chairperson of the National Services Authority,
Chairperson of the Academic Council of the Indian Law Institute, Executive
Council member of the National Judicial Academy and the WB National
University of Juridical Sciences. She is a member of the International

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 APPENDIX
Association of Women Judges and advisor to the Asia Pacific Forum on
Equality Issues, as well as member of the Committee of experts on the
Application of Conventions and Recommendations, International Labour
Organization.

Lieutenant General (retd.) H S Panag is former GOC-in-C of the army’s

Northern Command, Udhampur, and Central Command, Lucknow. He is
experienced in both counter-insurgency and high-altitude operations, and
has served as an Instructor in the Indian Military Officers’ Training
Academy, commanded an Infantry brigade, the 31 Armoured Division and
the XXI Corps, the strike formation of the Southern Command. Post-
retirement he was appointed an Administrative Member of the Armed Forces
Tribunal, Chandigarh Bench. His awards include the Param Vishisht Seva
Medal and the Ati Vishisht Seva Medal. He is a frequent contributor to the
media on strategic and military affairs and an expert on Chinese strategic
planning.

Amitabha Pande is a former member of the Punjab Cadre of the Indian

Administrative Service who retired in 2008 as the Secretary of the Inter State
Council of the Government of India, a constitutional machinery for federal
policy coordination, diversity management and consensus building between
the Union of India and the states, and among the states. The Council
represents India in the Forum of Federations – an international organisation
for the promotion of federalism with headquarters in Ottawa, Canada. He
has written several articles on the subject of intergovernmental relations in
India, with a focus on the dynamics of the interplay between democracy,
diversity, identity and the idea of a monolithic ‘nation state’. He also had a
long stint in the Ministry of Defence involving close interaction with the
armed forces. That and his experience in Punjab during its most troubled
period has given him insights into security related issues which have a
bearing on the current situation in Jammu and Kashmir.

Gopal Pillai (co-chair) is a former member of the Kerala Cadre of the Indian
Administrative Service, who retired as Union Home Secretary in June 2011.
He has served as Under Secretary/Deputy Secretary in the Defence Ministry,
Deputy Secretary Labour, Kerala Special Secretary for Industries, Secretary
Health and Family Welfare, Principal Secretary to the Chief Minister of
Kerala, Joint Secretary (North East) in the Home Ministry, Additional
Secretary in the Department of Commerce, Special Secretary in Commerce,

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APPENDIX

and Secretary in the Department of Commerce, before becoming Union

Home Secretary (2009-11). As Union Home Secretary, he dealt closely with
security, political, legal and humanitarian issues relating to Jammu and
Kashmir. Along with the then Home Minister, he instituted the Multi-Agency
Centre for security and intelligence coordination between the Centre and
States (MAC), and floated the National Counter-Terrorism Centre (NCTC)
and the Crime and Criminal Tracking Network System (CCTNS).

Justice Anjana Prakash is a former judge of the Patna High Court (2009-
2016). She has practiced law since 1982 and is currently a senior advocate
based out of Delhi. She is also a frequent contributor of opinion pieces on
constitutional issues in journals, such as Live Law, and newspapers,
including The Wire. In early 2020 she served as amicus curiae to the
Supreme Court on the death penalty for the Nirbhaya rape-murder convicts.

Nirupama Rao was Foreign Secretary in the Government of India (2009-

2011) and earlier served as Spokesperson of the Ministry of External Affairs;
she was High Commissioner of India in Sri Lanka and Ambassador to the
People’s Republic of China. She was Ambassador of India to the United
States from 2011 to 2013. On retirement, Rao was a Fellow at Brown
University and also taught there from 2015-16. She was George Ball Adjunct
Professor at Columbia University in Fall 2018. In 2019, she was a Pacific
Leadership Fellow at UC San Diego. She is a Global Fellow of The Woodrow
Wilson Center, Washington DC and Councillor of the World Refugee Council.
She is a frequent contributor of opinion pieces on foreign policy and global
affairs to a number of Indian media outlets.

Moosa Raza is a polyglot and a respected scholar of Islam who has been
Principal Secretary to the Chief Minister of Gujarat, Chief Secretary in
Jammu and Kashmir, Adviser to the Governor of Uttar Pradesh, and
Secretary to the Government of India in the Cabinet Secretariat and in the
Ministry of Steel. Currently, he is the chairman of the South Indian
Educational Trust (SIET), which runs six educational institutions, and of the
Executive Committee of Coastal Energen Pvt. Ltd. In 2010, he was honoured
with the Padma Bhushan. His latest book is Kashmir: Land of Regrets
(Context: 2019).

Anand K. Sahay is a columnist who has held senior positions at the Patriot,
Times of India, The Hindu, BITV, Hindustan Times and Asian Age and

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written for the Indian Express, Times of India, Economic Times, The Wire
and the Citizen. He reported and commented for the BBC in New Delhi and
London and was a Kabul-based advisor to the Afghanistan Times. He
reported the fall of Gorbachev and end of communism out of Moscow, the
dismantling of apartheid and the first all-race election in South Africa and
the transfer of Hong Kong to China, as well as insurgency and militant
politics in Kashmir, Punjab and Assam. He has been visiting professor at the
Nehru Centre, Jamia Millia Islamia University and guest lecturer at the
National Defence College. He has also been president of the Press Club of
India.

Shivani Sanghavi is a lawyer, activist and consultant on matters

concerning civilian security in armed conflict, international humanitarian
law, and access to justice.

Probir Sen joined the Indian Administrative Service after graduating from
Cambridge, and retired as Secretary to the Government of India and
Secretary General of the National Human Rights Commission. During the
course of his career he headed a large number of organizations, including
Indian Airlines and Air India. After retirement he was appointed Director,
India International Centre and subsequently served on the Boards of a
number of corporations, companies, trusts and NGOs. He possesses wide
exposure to issues relating to management, organizational development and
leadership.

Shantha Sinha, is the Founder Secretary of M V Foundation which

withdrew over a million children from child labour and enabled completion
of their education up to class 10. She headed the National Commission for
the Protection of Child Rights as its first Chairperson for two consecutive
terms from 2007-2013. She also served as a Professor, Department of
Political Science, University of Hyderabad. She is a recipient of the Ramon
Magsaysay Award, 2003, for community leadership and was awarded the
Padma Shri in 1998 by the Government of India.

Justice Ajit Prakash Shah served as a judge of the Bombay High Court
and later as Chief Justice of Madras and Delhi High Courts. After retirement,
he headed the Twentieth Law Commission of India (2013-2015), which
submitted 19 reports, including on the Arbitration and Conciliation Act,
commercial courts, electoral reforms and the death penalty. He has been

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Chairperson of the Broadcasting Content Complaints Council (BCCC), a self

regulatory body appointed by the Indian Broadcasting Foundation, and
member of the Governing Council appointed by the Ministry of Law and
Justice for judicial reforms. He also served as member of the Expert
Committee of the International Labour Organization for implementation of
ILO Conventions by member countries and headed a Committee appointed
by the Planning Commission for drafting the Privacy and Data Protection
Laws. He is nominated as the Commissioner in the International
Commission of Jurists (ICJ). He has also acted as ombudsman for sports
bodies such as the Board for Cricket Control in India.

60