Exclusive: Mass graves found in south Kashmir too

Zubair Ahmad* points at the mud-covered graves. He is jittery - playing in his mind are flashbacks from the day in the mid-’90s when security forces handed over three charred half-bodies to the local Auqaf Committee for burial.

Ahmad, who was in his early 20s then, witnessed the burial, in the village graveyard, of unidentified bodies of alleged ‘militants’. The graveyard gradually became the resting place for more and more unidentified bodies brought there by the security forces.

“From the mid-’90s to the early 2000s, security forces and the police brought bodies in vans for burial in the graveyard,” he said. “Once, five boys who looked like they were teenagers were brought for burial.”

For several years, body bags continued to pour in until the graveyard was filled to capacity. The local Auquaf committee says there could be more than 70 unmarked graves in the cemetery.

“It used to be a village graveyard,” says Molvi Bashir Ahmed, the Mirwaiz of Jama Masjid and chairman of the central Auqaf Committee. “Since Bindu village is central in the Breng area, and the police station is nearby, the bodies were handed over to us. We, as Muslims, thought it was our religious duty and buried them in the local graveyard.”

Bindu is a strategically located, with Kishtwar in Jammu region on one side and Anantnag on the other.

“We were told that these bodies belonged to unidentified militants. But we did not know who they were. People from different areas, including Kishtwar, came to us enquiring whether any of their kin were buried in the graveyard. We referred them to the police station, telling them that cops might have photographs of the dead,” says Molvi Bashir.

South Kashmir has, so far, remained insulated from the unmarked graves controversy, even as north Kashmir remains in the limelight after the investigative wing of the State Human Rights Commission (SHRC) found 2,156 unidentified bodies buried in 38 graveyards across three districts.

Jammu and Kashmir minister of state for home, Nasir Aslam Wani, said he will look into the matter of unmarked graves in south Kashmir. “I have to check this. Since you told me, I will look into this,” he said.

Defence spokesman Lt Col JS Brar refused to comment on this issue. Human rights groups say this only proves that no district is free from the unmarked graves. “The fact of the matter is that no district in Kashmir is free from unmarked graves,” said Khurram Parvez, Liaison International People’s Tribunal on Human Rights and Justice (IPT), and programme coordinator, Jammu and Kashmir Coalition of Civil Society.

IPT had come out with a report titled ‘Buried Evidence’, documenting 2,700 unknown, unmarked, mass graves, containing 2,943 bodies, across 55 villages in Bandipora, Baramulla, and Kupwara districts of Kashmir. The report was based on research conducted from November 2006-November 2009.

The IPT report was the second, and comes on the heels of an Association of Parents of Disappeared People (APDP) report in 2008 about nameless graves. Titled ‘Facts Under Ground’, the report detailed 940 to 1,000 nameless graves of unidentified slain people.

“I remember chief minister Omar Abdullah telling people to come forward for DNA testing. But nobody came forward,” says Mustafa Kamaal, additional general secretary and spokesman of the ruling National Conference.

Jammu Massacre 1947: " A Father killed his daughters to save them from getting raped"

It is one of the least known genocides in the modern history. It was carried out with such a precision that it is difficult to find its traces, except in the memories of the survivors, and the tales of horror they passed on to their next generation. It started on November 6, 1947. Nearly two hundred thousand innocent Muslims were slaughtered by Dogra army and extremists in Jammu region.

The genocide was carried out to cleanse the Muslims from Jammu region. The Dogra troops backed up by the extremists succeeded in pushing half a million Muslims to Pakistan administered Kashmir and Pakistan.

Rashid’s father, brothers, sisters, wife, and a son were slaughtered Malik Abdul Rashid, a survivor from Reasi, currently settled in Rawalpindi, says he was 22-year old when the carnage happened.

“Men, women, children were killed in the cruelest manner, maimed, intimidated. The carnage continued for several days. I lost my father, brothers, sisters, wife, and a son,” Rashid said.
“I lost all my dears; the genocide has haunted me all my life,” he said.

On 4 November 1947, when Dogra troops entered Reasi, two highly esteemed citizens of the town, Khwaja Amkullah and Chaudhary Aziz-u-Din rushed to the office of then Deputy Commissioner Thakur Gavinder Singh, complaining against the entry of the troops when Peace Committees, comprising Hindus and Muslims, were already in place to maintain peace. Both of them were shot dead in the office.
“People were mowed down with machine guns and swords during the night. And those who had survived were assembled in a field where they were put to death. Some women who escaped jumped into Chinab river to save their honour,”Rashid recounts.
“Khwaja Ali Muhammad of Bhadarwah who was performing his duties as a public prosecutor at Reasi went to a police station to save his life, but the duty officer, a Dogra, handed him over to the RSS men. They dragged him out and tortured him so much that he begged them to kill him than torture him. But the barbarians cut his fingers one by one and told him ‘we will send your fingers to Pakistan’. He was killed near the court premises in broad day light,” Rashid said.

Rashid said Maharaja Hari Singh orchestrated the carnage to eliminate Muslims from Jammu.“Muslims were not even allowed to have weapons for self defense, but Maharaja distributed arms to the marauders of his community,” he said, adding the killers were trained and armed in RSS camps for the genocide.
He said that Maharaja Hari Singh who fled from Srinagar to Jammu on 26 October1947 ordered his troops to kill Muslims everywhere.

“The carnage started in remote villages, and many Muslims fled to towns and district headquarters. But the killers were everywhere. Hundreds of Muslims committed suicide to avoid torture,” he said.
The killers kidnapped the daughter of legendary leader Chaudhary Ghulam Abbas, the prominent leader of Muslim Conference. Mistari Ahmed-u-Din hailing from Mast Garh Mohalla of Jammu himself killed his two daughters fearing the Hindu marauders would rape them.

On 4 November Muslims who had escaped slaughter were asked to assemble in a ground near police station in Jammu so that they would be driven to Pakistan in buses. On November 5 and 6, 1947, scores of buses, trucks and lorries, loaded with women, children and old men were taken into the wilderness of Kathua forests where Hindu extremists and armed gangs butchered them like chickens.”

‘MY 3 SISTERS WERE ABDUCTED, TWO WERE RECOVERED, SURAYA IS STILL MISSING’
Another Kashmiri migrant from Jammu, Muhammad Khan Naqashbandi, told Greater Kashmir that his mother was killed and three sisters were abducted by the marauders while they were traveling to Pakistan.
Two of his sisters were recovered, but the youngest sister Suraya was still missing. Teary eyed Khan said,“My sister is still missing and I don’t know whether she is alive or dead. I survived because I was studying in Lahore when the carnage occurred. No Muslim can forget that genocide.”Naqashbandi said the slaughter was well planned and rehearsed to prevent people from acceding to Pakistan. Muslims were slaughtered at Mavera near Samba on November 5 and the next day carnage was carried out near cantonment in Satvari.

‘OUT OF 6000, 250 SURVIVED’
Abdul Qayum Qureshi, a witness of the genocide, hails from Dalpatian Mohalla of Jammu. Qureshi told this scribe that the blood-bath of Muslims in Jammu province had started several weeks ago but the hunt against Muslims intensified when frustrated Maharaja of the state entered into Jammu on 26 October 1947 and ordered his troops to kill Muslims wherever they can be found. Mohalla Dalpatian was a Muslim majority area where thousands of Muslims from other areas had taken shelter.

“There was a big ground where these refugees were camping. Volunteers were guarding them, but everybody lived in a state of fear. The extremists and Dogra soldiers had besieged the area but they did not dare to enter the area. Muslim volunteers led by a former army official Captain Naseer-u-din defended the camp bravely,” Qureshi said.

Qureshi narrated the horrors thus:
“Meanwhile a fresh group of refugees arrived but the ground was full so they were accommodated in an empty Haveli (a mansion). But the killers had taken positions in a trench close to the Haveli. And when people entered the Haveli premises, the killers started indiscriminate firing, but the Muslim volunteers fought back. Then a Dogra official, Chetan Chopra, arrived with the message that he wanted to talk to Captain Naseer-ud-din. Around 4 PM Captain Naseer returned saying the administration has announced a ceasefire and assured that the violators will be punished. The ceasefire continued for seven days but the situation remained tense. On 5 November Muslims were asked to assemble in the police lines Jammu. I remember about 26 trucks and buses were present in the police grounds. People were ordered to board the vehicles so that they could be driven to Pakistan via Sialkot border. The Dogra officials circulated a rumor that these vehicles have reached Pakistan. We had absolutely no idea that they were butchered in the Kuthwa and Samaba forests.

On 6 November a caravan of refuges in buses and trucks was driven towards the border area. I was also part of this caravan. But after half an hour drive the entire caravan was turned towards Bisna. Around 11 AM all of us, about 6000, were dragged out of the buses. Then they fired at us indiscriminately. The bloodbath continued for nearly three hours; like other people I took refuge in a canal. People hid under thorny bushes and wherever they could. At 3 PM the Dogra officials asked the survivors to come out hiding so that they could be driven to safe places. Having no alternative we came out, and fortunately on the directives of Sheikh Muhammad Abdullah we were later shifted to a refugee camp in Jammu. Only 250 had survived. My father was in the Valley and my two brothers were in Mirpur.”

The Massacre is long forgotten and lost in the memories of today. This massacre changed the History of Jammu Kashmir forever.

JAMMU GENOCIDE OF 1947-REMEMBERING 6TH NOVEMBER

By: Abdul Majeed Zargar

It is one of the least known genocides in the modern history. It was carried out with such a precision that it is difficult to find its traces, except in the memories of the survivors, and the tales of horror they passed on to their next generation. Around five lakh Muslims were killed with a military precision. It was such an operation that language lacks words to express this offence of demolition of human being.

Though the targeted killing had already started in Jammu around Mid July 1947, the operation got a fillip immediately after fleeing Maharaja Hari Singh & his wife reached Jammu on October 26^th 1947. An organised carnage was orchestrated to kill Muslims, wherever found or spotted in Jammu.

British daily "the London Times" quoting its special correspondent in India states that the Maharaja, under his own supervision, got assassinated 2,37,000 Muslims, using military forces in Jammu area. The editor of "Statesman" Ian Stephen, in his book "Horned Moon" writes that till the end of autumn 1947 , more than 200,000 Muslims were murdered in one go.

The Hindu Dogra ruler’s main aim was to change the demographic composition of the region by eliminating the Muslim population. Such was the intensity of carnage that in Jammu province about 123 villages were ‘completely depopulated’. Kathua district ‘lost’ almost fifty per cent of its Muslim population. Thousands of Gujars were massacred inmohalla Ram Nagar. Village Raipur, within Jammu cantonment area was completely burnt down. The Dogra state troops were at the forefront of attacks on Muslims. The state authorities were also issuing arms not only to local volunteer organizations such as RSS, but to those in surrounding East Punjab districts such as Gurdaspur. The state administration had not only demobilised a large number of Muslim soldiers serving in the state army, but Muslim police officers, whose loyalty was suspect, had also been sent home. In Jammu city, the Muslim military were disarmed and the Jammu cantonment Brigadier Khuda Baksh replaced by a Hindu Dogra officer. Meanwhile Maharaja of Patiala was not only supplying weapons, but also a Brigade of Patiala State troops were also operating in Jammu and Kashmir, without whose help & assistance ,the objective could not have been achieved with such a precision . The daily Times of London reported the events in Jammu with such a front page headings: ‘Elimination of Muslims from Jammu’ and pointed out that the Maharaja Hari Singh was ‘in person commanding all the forces’ which were ethnically cleansing the Muslims.

That there was a design to change the demographics is evidenced by another well-reported incident. Prime Minister of Jammu and Kashmir, Mehr Chand Mahajan upon arrival in Jammu told a delegation of Hindus, which met him in the Palace, that now when the power was being transferred to the people they should better demand parity. When one of the delegation members wanted to know how that is possible, Mahajan, Pointing to the Ramnagarnatural reserve below, where some Muslim corpses were still lying said, ‘the population ratio too can change’ like that.( Elimination of Muslims from Jammu’ II, The Times, London, 10 August 1948, p. 5.-See also Ved Bhasin’s interview to a local Magzine)

Both documentary and oral sources suggest that the crime committed on the Muslims was nothing less than an organized holocaust. Sheikh Mohd. Abdullah, who was appointed “ Chief Emergency Administrator” on 30^th October 1947 could not prevent the carnage. He writes in his Autobiography Atish Chinar (page 312)“ that the carnage got impetus after the arrival of Union Home Minster Sardar Patel, Union Defence Minster Baldev Singh along with Maharaja of Patiala, a person known for his anti-Muslim bias, in Jammu. The trio met various Hindu organizations & delegations, after which the massacre attained a great momentum. Hindu fanatics, aided & abetted by Govt. forces, started burning down village after village inhabited by Muslims. Women were raped at will.Weapons were distributred freely to marauders from the Kachi Chawni house of Pandith Prem Nath Dogra and motivated by Balraj Madohk.

On 6^th November surviving muslims were told to assemble in an open ground, herded in trucks like cattle & killed mercilessly with Machine Gun fire between Digiana & Samba belt. Women were abducted & raped. Even the daughter of Legendary Chaudhary Ghulam Abbas was not spared. Many women preferred death than falling prey to the cruel beasts, who do not tire calling themselves as secular people.

On ground the killing operations were organized, directed & supervised by Maharani Tara Devi in league with her Debauch Guru Sat Dev & Governor Jammu Chet Ram Chopra. At politico-adminstrative level Sheikh puts the blame solely on Dogra ruler Hari Singh and Prime Minster Mahajan . At one point of time Sheikh had even thought of initiating action against the duo for crimes against humanity (Atish Chinar-page 331).But why did’nt he translate his thoughts into action, remains shrouded in mystery. Did he surrender this right as quid pro quid for Prime Minstership, which came his way in March 1948? As is generally known, Govt. Of India & Dogra ruler were only interested in conceding him a limited role in a “Mysore type of Govt.”But later this plan was changed & sheikh offered full fledged prime Minstership.

The other aspect of the carnage was appropriation of properties of Muslims. The Muslim names were immediately erased to conform to new ownership. For instance Urdu Bazar became Rajinder Bazar and Islamia School became Hari Singh High School to conform to new ownership.Almost ninety five per cent of left over properties which should have, in the normal course been taken over by State Govt, was allowed to be appropriated by looters & rioters. The daily Telegraph of London reported on 12 January 1948: ‘Yet another element in the situation is provided by rioters who seized Muslim lands in Jammu… they originated the massacres there last October to clear for themselves new territory.

Another incident needs a mention here. When Hindu refugees from Muzaffarabad & surrounding areas reaching Kashmir desired to be sent to Jammu or Punjab, local muslims motivated Kashmiri “Tonga-wallas” (horse-cart drivers) to transport them to Jammu against heavy odds. Initially 22 “tongawallas” were hired. They were later joined by many others from Khannabal-Qazigund rural belt. On return all these poor “tongawalls” were massacred near Nagrota. Their only fault was that they made Hindu refugees to reach their destinations safely.

What makes this holocaust unique is the complicity of State on the one hand & the exemplary treatment of Kashmiri Muslims to its minorities on the other hand, given the grave provocation of Jammu genocide . Mahtama Gandhi was so disgusted with the carnage that on two occasions (November 27, & December 27 1947), he made mention of it in following words.

"The Hindus and Sikhs of Jammu and those who had gone there from outside killed Muslims there. Their women have been dishonored. This has not been fully reported in the newspapers. The Maharaja of Kashmir is responsible for what has happened there” (Collected Works of Mahatma Gandhi; volume 90, page 115 & 298). It is no wonder then when that when Gandhi was killed by a RSS supported Hindu fanatic, sweets were distributed throughout Jammu in special Thalis supplied from Maharaja’s Palace.

A fitting tribute to those unsung Martyrs of Jammu will be to install a symbolic Epitaph with brief inscription of the incident at Mazar-i-Shuda, Idd-gah. Let the first line of that inscription be

“Qareeb Hai Rouz e Mahshar, Chhupegaa Kushtoon Kaa Khoon Kyoon Kar,
Jo Chup Rahegi Zubaan- e- Khanjar, Lahoo Pukaaregaa Aasteen Kaa.”

(The author is a practicing Chartered Accountant)

Photo Feature: Children being humiliated publicly before their release by occupational forces

Sixteen Minors who were detained by occupational forces being humiliated publicly before their release

Mirwaiz In Response To The Queries From Aalaw & Frontline | Kashmir

Urging people to repose trust in the separatist leadership, Hurriyat (M) chairman, Mirwaiz Umar

Farooq Friday responded to a host of serious questions raised by a facebook community on the role of Hurriyat in the dialogue process and other issues.

‘Aalaw’, the facebook community with more than 8000 followers, had written an open letter to Mirwaiz asking him to clarify his party’s stand on some of the crucial policy issues. Replying to the queries, Mirwaiz told Rising Kashmir that people have the right to question the separatist leadership, but at the same “they should trust us”.

About the talks with New Delhi, he said the real dialogue process virtually stopped in 2006. “We had a dialogue process with New Delhi and we proposed many things but not even a single proposal was accepted by the Indian authorities. So our stand is clear now, no dialogue until the proposed things are not implemented on ground.”

The Hurriyat (M) chief said his party will never consider the back channel negotiations as a dialogue process “until and unless India doesn’t agree to what we feel is important for improving ground situation for a meaningful and result oriented dialogue process that would ultimately lead us to amicable resolution of this long pending issue.”

One of the questions posed by ‘Aalaw’ to Mirwaiz was about his participation in a lunch programme attended by interlocutor, Radha Kumar, some mainstream politicians, a former Ikhwani (government gunman) and a PDP agent.

“We live in a society where we have friends and sometimes it becomes obligatory for us to participate in functions organized by them,” said Mirwaiz.

‘Aalaw’ had brought to fore Mirwaiz’s participation in the said function organized by a local editor at Manasbal.

“A friend of mine invited me for a lunch and it was a mere coincidence that the interlocutor and other pro-India politicians were also present there. It was just a social gathering and no conversation took place. I had no idea who others were invited.”

Miwiaz further said his participation in the function shouldn’t be taken as something that will harm the Kashmir cause.

“Our faith is not so weak that it will be shaken by mere participation in the social gatherings. People have the right to question, but they should trust us. Being at a place where the objectionable people are also present doesn’t mean that we have run away from our stand. People should trust us and we will uphold that trust at all costs.”

In response to the query as to why despite being a chief cleric, he was opposed to an idea of “Islamic State” for Jammu and Kashmir, Mirwaiz said in the present geo-political scenario such demand will weaken the Kashmir issue at the international level.

“I am not against the idea of an Islamic state. What our party believes is that Kashmir is a political issue and until and unless apolitical resolution doesn’t evolve, we have to take the struggle as it is. Once the people of the state are given the right to decide their future, they have the will to choose the destiny for the state.”

“At present we have to portray it as a political issue and have to take along all other communities. If we give it a religious overtone, the support at the international level will not be there for us. We don’t have to portray that our struggle is Muslim Kashmiris against the Hindu India. I don’t deny that the evolution of this issue is a result of Muslim Pakistan versus Hindu India but the times have changed.”

One of the questions posed by ‘Aalaw’ was about the role of Hurriyat (M) in helping the orphans, the widows and those who are languishing in different jails across India.

Mirwaiz acknowledged that his party has not done much for those who have suffered during the 20 years of turmoil.

“We do what we could with our available resources but I must acknowledge that it is not enough. We have a cell Dar-ul Khairat and we do help people who are in need but it is not that big.” He said Hurriyat (M) has not gone for any massive fund raising exercise keeping in view how much people have suffered economically during the past three years.

“But collectively, the society and leadership can do what will be more effective in helping those who are in real need. The community must help us so that those who have sacrificed for the freedom struggle should not suffer.”

Mirwaiz said his party provides legal aid to the prisoners. “But that is also not upto the level that we could help all. We try to help those who are lodged here but sometimes people don’t come to us and moreover, the lawyers outside the valley demand huge money to fight cases of our people. We are not able to help them. Our help to them is also limited.”

How India alienated Kashmiri people

BY: AIJAZ ZAKA SYED

An unjust law is no law, warned Martin Luther King, the celebrated U.S. human rights icon. The Kashmiris have been living with suchlaws for decades. At least one in every five Kashmiris has at some point or another in his/her life suffered violence, humiliation, torture and old-fashioned abuse at the hands of security forces without any recourse to justice or a distant promise of retribution

Is it any wonder then the Kashmiris today find themselves hopelessly alienated and persecuted even as our politicians never tire of pronouncing the state an “integral and inseparable” part of India?.

The Armed Forces (Special Powers) Act has been a license to abuse, torture and kill the Kashmiris in their own land. A law that confers “special powers” on men in uniform to do as they please and get away with it; a law that the UN says violates “contemporary international human rights standards” and a law that cannot be challenged in any court of law no matter how grave the crime.

Following the division of the subcontinent in 1947 when India and Pakistan actively courted the princely state of Jammu and Kashmir, it was promised a “special status” and special treatment by New Delhi. The Article 370 of Indian Constitution was supposed to protect that “special status” of Kashmir. We made a lot of other promises as well that are too familiar to revisit here.

And we have ensured and protected that “special status” of Kashmir by gifting them the AFSPA that offers sweeping powers to the security forces while ensuring their total immunity. This special law has turned the Vale of Kashmir that the Moguls believed was paradise on earth into a beautiful hell.

How did we end up here? Who lost the paradise? The answer is out there and everyone knows it. In our desperation and determination to keep Kashmir with us and away from our neighbor, we have ended up losing the Kashmiri people.

Of course, the role played by Pakistani agencies, not to mention groups such as the one led by Hafiz Saeed, who have made a business enterprise of jihad, in adding to the woes of Kashmiris isn’t in anyway insignificant.

But if an entire generation of Kashmiris has grown up loathing all things Indian it is because of the excessive presence of the security forces in the Valley and their heavy-handed approach to the local population. And if there is one thing that epitomizes all that has go

ne wrong with India’s Kashmir affair, it is the AFSPA. This black law has created a dangerous, ever deepening disconnect and gulf between the Kashmiris and the rest of India. A draconian law that belongs in a police state, not in the world’s largest democracy.

Thanks to these “special powers”, just about anybody could be picked up from anywhere any time, kicked, abused, raped, killed in broad daylight or simply disappeared and no one including the state government can do anything about it.

Security forces are a law unto themselves. And you see their power in full display all across the state including in capital Srinagar. There are more soldiers than tourists or even locals constantly reminding the Kashmiris of the original sin of being born in this land of incredible beauty. Peaceful protests last year saw scores of young people, some of them as young as nine, felled by the bullets of the forces that are supposed to protect them. In the course of fighting terrorists and cross-border infiltrators, we have turned this beautiful land into a permanent war zone and its proud people a hostage in this never-ending conflict with the neighbor. This war has claimed more than a hundred thousand Kashmiris over the past two decades, not to mention the tens of thousands who have gone “missing.”
If the 2,730 unmarked mass graves recently discovered across the state had been found elsewhere they could have shaken the world, as they did in Srebrenica, in Iraq and Rwanda. But they were met with stony silence in the ever-shrill Indian media and its self-righteous Western counterparts.

Human rights groups including the State Human Rights Commission that finally acted on the complaints of thousands of families of “disappeared persons” unearthing graves with hundreds of bullet riddled bodies fear this may be a tip of the iceberg. The dead in Kashmir have finally begun to speak up, as Arundhati Roy so evocatively puts it. But justice may still elude the victims as long as the AFSPA reigns in Jammu and Kashmir. And India’s powerful security and defense establishment, including the army, are determined to retain it. And why wouldn’t they? It’s this law that allows the security forces to rule and treat Kashmir as their fiefdom without anyone, including the elected government, questioning their authority and excesses. Despite being a fine and vibrant democracy with robust democratic institutions and judiciary that we can justifiably be proud of, we are yet to realize that no people can be governed at gunpoint. Not in this age and time. Not with black laws like the AFSPA and not by constantly waving half a million guns that have contributed to the alienation of Kashmiri society and radicalization of its youth. If India is to win Kashmiri hearts and minds, it could do so only with love, compassion, respect and justice.

(The writer is a Middle East-based commentator. This article first appeared in Arab News on Nov. 3, 2011.)