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Exodus of Kashmiri Hindus

Political map of the Kashmir region, showing the Indian-administered Kashmir Valley or Vale of Kashmir from which a large proportion of Hindus have migrated out
Date	1947 to 1950 and January to March 1990
Location	South Asia
Coordinates	34°02′00″N 74°40′00″E / 34.0333°N 74.6667°E / 34.0333; 74.6667
Outcome	20% of Pandits left the Kashmir valley between 1947 and 1950, fearing uncertainty and decline in the wake of land reforms of 1950. Between January and March 1990, according to several scholarly estimates, 100,000 Pandits of an estimated population of 140,000 fled the Valley; some scholars estimate the number to be 150,000. By 2011, somewhere between 2,700 and 3,400 Pandits had remained in the Valley. A negligible number have returned.

The Exodus of Kashmiri Hindus, who are also called "Kashmiri Pandits", is the migration, especially en masse, or the flight, especially large-scale, that caused their displacement from the Kashmir Valley. The Valley has been administered by India since 1947 and is a part of the larger Kashmir region that has been the subject of a dispute between India and Pakistan from approximately the same time. Before 1947, during the British Raj in India when Jammu and Kashmir was a princely state, Kashmiri Pandits, or Kashmiri Hindus, had stably constituted between 4% and 6% of the population of the Kashmir valley in censuses from 1889 to 1941; the remaining 94 to 95% of the population was Kashmiri Muslim. The landlords in the Kashmir Valley were, for the most part, Hindus and the peasants Muslim; the Pandits, at less than 5% of the population owned 30% of the arable land. After the princely state's accession to India in 1947, and announcements of land reforms in 1950, some 20% of the Pandits migrated out the valley in a mass exodus, according to one scholar, and 8,000 had done the same by May 1953, according to another. They judged the accession to be uncertain and feared an economic and social decline in the wake of land reforms.

In 1989, a persisting insurgency began in Kashmir. It was fed by Kashmiri dissatisfaction with India's federal government both for rigging an assembly election in 1987 and disavowing a promise of greater autonomy. The dissatisfaction overflowed into an ill-defined uprising against the Indian state. The Jammu and Kashmir Liberation Front (JKLF), an organization whose objectives at the time were political, not religious, led the uprising but did not abjure violence. In early 1990, the vast majority of the remaining Kashmiri Hindus fled the valley in a mass-migration. According to several scholars, approximately 100,000 of an estimated Kashmiri Pandit population of 140,000 left in the span of a few weeks in February–March 1990. More of them left in the following years so that, by 2011, only around 3,000 families remained. Other scholars have suggested a higher figure of approximately 150,000 for the exodus.

The reasons for this migration are vigorously contested. In 1989–1990, as calls by Kashmiri Muslims for independence from India gathered pace, many Kashmiri Pandits, who viewed self-determination to be anti-national, felt under pressure. Political violence, especially the killings in the 1990s of a number of Pandit officials, may have shaken the community's sense of security, although it is thought some Pandits—by virtue of their evidence given later in Indian courts—may have acted as agents of the Indian state. The Pandits killed in targeted assassinations by the Jammu and Kashmir Liberation Front (JKLF) included some high-profile ones. Occasional calls were made from mosques on loudspeakers asking Pandits to leave the valley. News of threatening letters created fear, though in later interviews the letters were seen to have been sparingly received. There were disparities between the accounts of the two communities, the Muslims and the Pandits. Many Kashmiri Pandits believed they were forced out of the Valley either by Pakistan and the militants it supported or the Kashmiri Muslims as a group. Many Muslims in the Valley believed that the then Governor, Jagmohan had encouraged the Pandits to leave so as to have a free hand in more thoroughly pursuing reprisals against Muslims. Several scholarly views chalk the migration to genuine panic among the Pandits that stemmed as much from the religious vehemence among some of the insurgents as by the absence of guarantees for the Pandits' safety issued by the Governor.

The cause of the Pandits was quickly championed by right-wing Hindu groups in India, which also preyed on their insecurities and further alienated them from Kashmiri Muslims. Many Kashmiri Muslims did not support violence against religious minorities; the departure of the Kashmiri Pandits offered an excuse for casting Kashmiri Muslims as Islamic radicals, thereby contaminating their more genuine political grievances, and offering a rationale for their surveillance and violent treatment by the Indian state. The return to the homeland in Kashmir also constitutes one of the main points of the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party's election platform. Some displaced Kashmiri Pandits have formed an organization called Panun Kashmir ("Our own Kashmir"), which has asked for a separate homeland for Kashmiri Hindus in the Valley but has opposed autonomy for Kashmir on the grounds that it would promote the formation of an Islamic state. Kashmiri Pandits are not considered "refugees" as they have not crossed an international border. Many would like to be considered Internally Displaced Persons (IDPs), but the Indian government has denied them that status, fearing international involvement in Kashmir, which it considers to be its internal affairs. The Indian government considers Kashmiri Pandits to be 'migrants.'

At the time of their exodus, very few Pandits expected their exile to last beyond a few months. Kashmiri Pandits initially moved to the Jammu Division, the lower half of what is today the Indian-administered union territory of Jammu and Kashmir, where they lived in refugee camps, sometimes in unkempt and unclean surroundings. As the exile lasted longer, many displaced Pandits who were in the urban elite were able to find jobs in other parts of India, but those in the lower-middle-class, especially those from rural areas languished longer in refugee camps, with some living in poverty; this generated tensions with the host communities—whose social and religious practices, although Hindu, differed from those of the brahmin Pandits—and rendered assimilation more difficult. Many displaced Pandits in the camps succumbed to emotional depression and a sense of helplessness. Kashmiri Pandits in exile have also written autobiographical memoirs, novels, and poetry to record their experiences and to understand them.

Background

Under the 1975 Indira–Sheikh Accord, Sheikh Abdullah agreed to measures previously undertaken by the central government in Jammu and Kashmir to integrate the state into India. Farrukh Faheem, a sociologist at the University of Kashmir, states that it was met with hostility among the people of Kashmir and laid the groundwork for the future insurgency. Those opposed to the accords included Jamaat-e-Islami Kashmir, People's League in Indian Jammu and Kashmir, and the Jammu Kashmir Liberation Front (JKLF) based in Pakistani-administered Azad Jammu and Kashmir. Since the mid-1970s, communalist rhetoric was being exploited in the state for votebank politics. Around this time, Pakistan's Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) tried to spread Wahhabism in place of Sufism to foster religious unity within their nation, and the communalization aided their cause.

The ISI's initial attempts to sow widespread unrest in Kashmir against the Indian administration were largely unsuccessful until the late-1980s. The American- and Pakistani-backed Afghan mujahideen's armed struggle against the Soviet Union in the Soviet–Afghan War, the Islamic Revolution in Iran and the Sikh insurgency in Indian Punjab against the Indian government became sources of inspiration for large numbers of Kashmiri Muslim youth. Both the pro-independence JKLF and pro-Pakistan Islamist groups including Jamaat-e-Islami Kashmir mobilized the rapidly-growing anti-Indian sentiments amongst the Kashmiri population; the year of 1984 saw a pronounced rise in terrorist violence in Kashmir. Following the execution of JKLF militant Maqbool Bhat in February 1984, strikes and protests by Kashmiri nationalists broke out in the region, where large numbers of Kashmiri youth participated in widespread anti-India demonstrations and consequently faced heavy-handed reprisals by state security forces.

Critics of the then-chief minister, Farooq Abdullah, charged him with losing control of the situation. His visit to Pakistani-administered Kashmir during this time became an embarrassment, where according to Hashim Qureshi, he shared a platform with the JKLF. Abdullah asserted that he went on behalf of Indira Gandhi and his father, so that sentiments there could "be known first hand", although few people believed him. There were also allegations that he had allowed Khalistani militants to train in Jammu, although these were never proved to be true. On 2 July 1984, Ghulam Mohammad Shah, who had support from Indira Gandhi, replaced his brother-in-law Farooq Abdullah and assumed the role of chief minister after Abdullah was dismissed, in what was termed a "political coup".

Shah's administration, which did not have people's mandate, turned to Islamists and opponents of India, notably the Molvi Iftikhar Hussain Ansari, Mohammad Shafi Qureshi and Mohinuddin Salati, to gain some legitimacy through religious sentiments. This gave political space to Islamists who previously lost overwhelmingly in the 1983 state elections. In 1986, Shah decided to construct a mosque within the premises of an ancient Hindu temple inside the New Civil Secretariat area in Jammu to be made available to the Muslim employees for 'Namaz'. People of Jammu took to streets to protest against this decision, which led to a Hindu-Muslim clash. In February 1986, Shah on his return to Kashmir valley retaliated and incited the Kashmiri Muslims by saying Islam Khatre Mein Hey (transl. Islam is in danger). As a result, Kashmiri Hindus were targeted by the Kashmiri Muslims. Many incidents were reported in various areas where Kashmiri Hindus were killed and their properties and temples damaged or destroyed. The worst hit areas were mainly in South Kashmir and Sopore. In Vanpoh, Lukbhavan, Anantnag, Salar and Fatehpur, Muslim mobs plundered or destroyed the properties and temples of Hindus. During the Anantnag riot in February 1986, although no Hindu was killed, many houses and other properties belonging to Hindus were looted, burnt or damaged. An investigation of Anantnag riots revealed that members of the 'secular parties' in the state, rather than the Islamists, had played a key role in organising the violence to gain political mileage through religious sentiments. Shah called in the army to curb the violence, but it had little effect. His government was dismissed on 12 March 1986, by the then Governor Jagmohan following communal riots in south Kashmir. This led Jagmohan to rule the state directly. The political fight was hence being portrayed as a conflict between "Hindu" New Delhi (Central Government), and its efforts to impose its will in the state, and "Muslim" Kashmir, represented by political Islamists and clerics.

The Islamists had organised under a banner named Muslim United Front, with a manifesto to work for Islamic unity and against political interference from the centre, and contested the 1987 state elections, in which they lost again. However, the 1987 elections are widely believed to have been rigged so as to help bring the secular parties (NC and INC) in Kashmir at the forefront. The corruption and alleged electoral malpractices were the catalysts for an insurgency. The Kashmiri militants killed anyone who openly expressed pro-India policies. Kashmiri Hindus were targeted specifically because they were seen as presenting Indian presence in Kashmir because of their faith. Though the insurgency had been launched by JKLF, groups rose over the next few months advocating for establishment of Nizam-e-Mustafa (administration based on Sharia) on Islamist groups proclaimed the Islamicisation of socio-political and economic set-up, merger with Pakistan, unification of ummah and establishment of an Islamic Caliphate. Liquidation of central government officials, Hindus, liberal and nationalist intellectuals, social and cultural activists was described as necessary to rid the valley of un-Islamic elements. The relations among the semi-secular and Islamist groups were generally poor and often hostile. The JKLF had also utilized Islamic formulations in its mobilization strategies and public discourse, using Islam and independence interchangeably. It demanded equal rights for everyone, however this had a distinct Islamic flavour as it sought to establish an Islamic democracy, protection of minority rights per Quran and Sunnah and an economy of Islamic socialism. The pro-separatist political practices at times deviated from their stated secular position.

Insurgency activity

Tika Lal Taploo

In July 1988, the Jammu Kashmir Liberation Front (JKLF) began a separatist insurgency for independence of Kashmir from India. The group targeted a Kashmiri Hindu for the first time on 14 September 1989, when they killed Tika Lal Taploo, an advocate and a prominent leader of Bharatiya Janata Party in Jammu and Kashmir, in front of several eyewitnesses. Taploo's killers were never caught. The Hindus felt that they were not safe in the valley and could be targeted any time. The killings of Kashmiri Hindus, including many prominent ones, continued. Most of the Kashmiri Hindus left Kashmir valley and moved to other parts of India, particularly to the refugee camps in Jammu region of the state.

Following attacks and threats

Soon after Taploo's death, Nilkanth Ganjoo, a judge of Srinagar High court who had sentenced Maqbul Bhat to death, was shot dead. On 4 November 1989, high court judge in Kashmir Neelkanth Ganjoo was killed near the High Court in Srinagar. In December 1989 members of JKLF kidnapped Rubaiya Sayeed, daughter of the-then Union Minister Mufti Mohammad Sayeed, demanding release of five militants, which was subsequently fulfilled.

On 4 January 1990, Srinagar-based newspaper Aftab released a message, threatening all Hindus to leave Kashmir immediately, sourcing it to the militant organization Hizbul Mujahideen. On 14 April 1990, another Srinagar based newspaper named Al-safa republished the same warning. The newspaper did not claim ownership of the statement and subsequently issued a clarification. Walls were pasted with posters with threatening messages to all Kashmiris to strictly follow Islamic rules which included abidance by the Islamic dress code, a prohibition on alcohol, cinemas, and video parlors and strict restrictions on women.

On 21 January 1990, two days after Jagmohan took over as governor, the Gawkadal massacre took place in Srinagar, in which the Indian security forces had opened fire on protesters, leading to the death of 50-280 people. These events led to lawlessness in the valley. Crowds with guns started roaming the streets. News of violent incidents kept coming and many of the Hindus who survived the night saved their lives by traveling out of the valley.

On 25 January 1990 the Rawalpora shooting incident took place wherein four Indian Air Force (IAF) personnel including Squadron Leader Ravi Khanna were killed and 40 other IAF personal were injured while they were waiting at Rawalpora bus stand for their vehicle to pick them up in the morning. The police post located nearby, with 7 armed constables and one head constable, did not react. Jammu Kashmir Liberation Front (JKLF), led by Yasin Malik, were charged for the murder and are currently under trial.

On 29 April 1990, Sarwanand Kaul Premi, a veteran Kashmiri poet was gruesomely murdered. Several intelligence operatives were assassinated, over the course of January. On 2 February 1990, Satish Tikoo, a young Hindu social worker was murdered near his house in Habba Kadal, Srinagar. On 13 February 1990, Lassa Kaul, Station Director of Srinagar Doordarshan, was shot dead. On 4 June 1990, Girija Tickoo, a Kashmiri Hindu teacher was gang raped by terrorists, who ripped her abdomen and chopped her body into two pieces with a saw machine while she was still alive. In December 1992, Hriday Nath Wanchoo, a trade union leader and human rights activist, was murdered with Kashmir separatist Ashiq Hussain Faktoo being convicted for the murder. Many Kashmiri Pandit women were kidnapped, raped and murdered, throughout the time of exodus.

Aftermath and recent developments

The militancy in Kashmir had increased after the exodus. The Militants had targeted the properties of Kashmiri Hindus after their exodus.

Village Defence Committees were set up in 1995 to protect Hindus from attacks in remote areas. Following the murder of a Kashmiri Hindu Sarpanch Ajay Pandita Bharti in June 2020, former Jammu and Kashmir police chief had said Shesh Paul Vaid that minority Hindus could be armed and Village Defence Committees could be set up with proper planning.

Hindus who stayed

Some Hindus did not leave the valley even during the peak of the exodus.

Pandits in exile

Kashmiri Hindus continue to fight for their return to the valley and many of them live as refugees. The exiled community had hoped to return after the situation improved. Most have not done so because the situation in the Valley remains unstable and they fear a risk to their lives. Most of them lost their properties after the exodus and many are unable to go back and sell them. Their status as displaced people has adversely harmed them in the realm of education. Many Hindu families could not afford to send their children to well regarded public schools. Furthermore, many Hindus faced institutional discrimination by predominantly Muslim state bureaucrats. As a result of the inadequate ad hoc schools and colleges formed in the refugee camps, it became harder for Hindu children to access education. They suffered in higher education as well, as they could not claim admission in post-graduate colleges of University of Jammu, while getting admitted in the institutes of Kashmir valley was out of question. The Indian government has taken up the issue of education of the displaced students from Kashmir, and helped them get admissions in various Kendriya Vidyalayas and major educational institutions and universities across the country.

Some Pandits have formed organisations such as the All India Kashmiri Samaj (AIKS) and Panun Kashmir. Panun Kashmir which means "Our Kashmir" is also the name of an eponymously name organisation that advocates for a homeland for Kashmiri Hindus.

Return and rehabilitation

The Indian Government has tried to rehabilitate the Hindus and some separatists have vocally invited the Hindus back to Kashmir.

As of 2016, a total of 1,800 Kashmiri Hindu youths have returned to the Valley since the announcing of ₹1,168 crore (equivalent to ₹33 billion or US$380 million in 2023) package in 2008 by the UPA government. R.K. Bhat, president of Youth All India Kashmiri Samaj criticised the package to be a mere eyewash and claimed that most of the youths were living in cramped prefabricated sheds or in rented accommodation. He also said that 4,000 vacancies have been lying vacant since 2010 and alleged that the BJP government was repeating the same rhetoric. The employment package was also extended to Hindus who did not migrate out of the valley with an amendment to J&K Migrants (Special Drive) Recruitment Rules, 2009 in October 2017.

In an interview with NDTV on 19 January 2016, Farooq Abdullah stated that the onus was on Kashmiri Hindus to come back themselves and nobody would beg them to do so. His comments were met with disagreement and criticism by Kashmiri Hindu authors Neeru Kaul, Siddhartha Gigoo, Congress MP Shashi Tharoor and Lt. General (retd.) Syed Ata Hasnain. He also said that during his tenure as Chief Minister in 1996, he had asked them to return but they refused to do so. He reiterated his comments on 23 January and said that the time had come for them to return.

The issue of separate townships for Kashmiri Hindus has been a source of contention in Kashmir valley with Islamists, separatists as well as mainstream political parties all opposing it. Hizbul Mujahideen militant, Burhan Muzaffar Wani, had threatened of attacking the "Hindu composite townships" which were meant to be built for the rehabilitation of the non-Muslim community. In a 6-minute long video clip, Wani described the rehabilitation scheme as resembling Israeli designs. However, Burhan Wani welcomed the Kashmiri Hindus to return and promised to guard them. He also promised a safe Amarnath Yatra. Kashmiri Hindus residing in the Valley also mourned Burhan Wani's death. Wani's self-styled successor in the Hizbul Mujahideen, Zakir Rashid Bhat, also asked the Kashmiri Hindus to return and ensured them protection. Tahir, the commander of a separatist Islamist group, ensured full protection to the Kashmiri Hindus.

Further attacks and exodus

During the 2016 Kashmir unrest, transit camps housing Kashmir Hindus in Kashmir were attacked by mobs. About 200–300 Kashmiri Hindu employees fled the transit camps in Kashmir during night time on 12 July due to the attacks by protesters on the camps and held protests against the government for attacks on their camp and demanded that all Kashmiri Hindus employees in Kashmir valley be evacuated immediately. Over 1300 government employees belonging to the community had fled the region during the unrest. Posters threatening the Hindus to leave Kashmir or be killed were also put up near transit camps in Pulwama allegedly by the militant organisation Lashkar-e-Toiba.

Article 370 and post revocation of special status

Some considered the now-abrogated Article 370 as a roadblock in the resettlement of Kashmiri Hindus as the Constitution of Jammu and Kashmir does not allow those living in India outside Jammu and Kashmir to freely settle in the state and become its citizens.

Following the revocation of the special status of Jammu and Kashmir, by August 2021, nine properties of Kashmiri Hindus who had fled the state was restored to them. In September 2021 a portal was launched for migrants including Kashmiri Hindus to address property related grievances stemming from the exodus.

Statistics

In early 1990, the vast majority of the remaining Kashmiri Hindus fled the valley in a mass-migration. According to several scholars, approximately 100,000 of an estimated Kashmiri Pandit population of 140,000 left in the span of a few weeks in February–March 1990. More of them left in the following years so that, by 2011, only around 3,000 families remained.

Other scholars have suggested a higher figure of approximately 150,000 for the exodus, or in one instance, 95% of 155,000-170,000 Hindus migrated from the Valley since violence began in 1989.

In 2010, the government of Jammu and Kashmir noted that 808 Hindus families, comprising 3,445 people, were still living in the Valley and that financial and other incentives put in place to encourage others to return there had been unsuccessful. According to a Jammu and Kashmir government report, 219 members of the Hindus community out of total 1400 Hindus, had been killed in the region between 1989 and 2004 but none thereafter.

The local organisation of Hindus in Kashmir, Kashmir Pandit Sangharsh Samiti (KPSS) after carrying out a survey in 2008 and 2009, said that 399 Kashmiri Hindus were killed by insurgents from 1990 to 2011 with 75% of them being killed during the first year of the Kashmiri insurgency, and that during the last 20 years, about 650 Hindus have been killed in the valley. Kashmiri Pandit Sangharsh Samiti, estimates 357 Hindus were killed in Kashmir in 1990.

Panun Kashmir, a political group representing the Hindus who fled Kashmir, has published a list of about 1,341 Hindus killed since 1990. An organisation called Roots of Kashmir filed a petition in 2017 to reopen 215 cases of more than 700 alleged murders of Kashmiri Hindus, however the Supreme Court of India refused its plea.

In popular culture

Sheen (2004) is a Bollywood film which uses Pandit statelessness and displacement as context for a love story. The 2020 Hindi film Shikara, and the upcoming film Kashmir Files are based on the exodus of Kashmiri Hindus. Small scale productions include the film Kashmir: The Final Resolution, the short film The Pashmina. and the amateur mini-documentary by Syed Waseem Rizvi. The apathy on the part of the government and the sufferings of the Kashmiri Hindus have been highlighted in a play titled 'Kaash Kashmir'. Such efforts or claims have lacked political will as journalist Rahul Pandita writes in a memoir Our Moon Has Blood Clots. Some books that cover the subject include The Infidel Next Door and The Garden of Solitude.

See also

• Human rights abuses in Jammu and Kashmir
• Destruction of Kashmiri Shias

Notes

1. Oxford English Dictionary Online defines exodus as- "The departure or going out, usually of a body of persons from a country for the purpose of settling elsewhere. Cf. 'emigration n. 2': The departure of persons from one country, usually their native land, to settle permanently in another.
2. Kashmiri Pandits are not considered "refugees" as they have not crossed an international border. Many Pandits would like to be considered Internally Displaced Persons (IDPs), but the Indian government has denied them that status, fearing international involvement in Kashmir, which it considers to be its internal affair. The Indian government considers Kashmiri Pandits to be 'migrants.'
3. Still another estimates it to be 190,000 of a total population of 200,000. The CIA Factbook estimated the number to be 300,000.
4. Still another estimates it to be 190,000 of a total population of 200,000. The CIA Factbook estimated the number to be 300,000.

References

1. ^ Rai, Mridu (2021), "Narratives from exile: Kashmiri Pandits and their construction of the past", in Bose, Sugata; Jalal, Ayesha (eds.), Kashmir and the Future of South Asia, Routledge Contemporary South Asia Series, Routledge, pp. 91–115, 106, Beginning in January 1990, such large numbers of Kashmiri Pandits – the com munity of Hindus native to the valley of Kashmir – left their homeland and so precipitously that some have termed their departure an exodus. Indeed, within a few months, nearly 100,000 of the 140,000- strong community had left for neighbouring Jammu, Delhi, and other parts of India and the world. One immediate impetus for this departure in such dramatically large numbers was the inauguration in 1989 of a popularly backed armed Kashmiri insurgency against Indian rule. This insurrection drew support mostly from the Valley's Muslim population. By 2011, the numbers of Pandits remaining in the Valley had dwindled to between 2,700 and 3,400, according to different estimates. An insignificant number have returned.
2. ""Exodus, n."", Oxford English Dictionary Online, Oxford University Press, 2021
3. • Evans 2002, p. 20(p. 19) The present article is structured as follows. First, it tries to explain what happened to KPs in 1990 and beyond. (p. 20) Examining the fall-out of the mass migration, it then looks at the extremist politics that followed, before concluding with an assessment of the contemporary situation. (p. 22) There is a third possible explanation for what happened in 1990; one that acknowledges the enormity of what took place, but that examines carefully what triggered KP migration: KPs migrated en masse through legitimate fear. (p. 24) While decennial growth rates rose between 1961 and 2001, the same period saw a degree of migration of KPs from Jammu & Kashmir.
     
   • Zia, Ather (2020), Resisting Disappearnce: Military Occupation and Women's Activism in Kashmir, University of Washington Press, p. 60,  In the early 1990s the Kashmiri Hindus, known as the Pandits (a 100,000 to 140,000 strong community), migrated en masse from Kashmir to Jammu, Delhi, and other places.
   • Hussain, Shahla (2018), "Kashmiri Visions of Freedom", Kashmir: History, Politics, Representation, Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, pp. 89–112, 105,  The rise of insurgency in the region created a difficult situation for the Kashmiri Hindu community, which had always taken pride in their Indian identity. Self-determination was not only seen as a communal demand, but as a secessionist slogan that threatened the security of the Indian state. The community felt threatened when Kashmiri Muslims under the flag of aazadi openly raised anti-India slogans. The 1989 targeted killings of Kashmiri Hindus who the insurgents believed were acting as Indian intelligence agents heightened those insecurities. In the winter of 1990, the community felt compelled to mass-migrate to Jammu, as the state governor was adamant that in the given circumstances he would not be able to offer protection to the widely dispersed Hindu community.
   • Duschinski, Haley (2014), "Community Identity of Kashmiri Hindus in the United States", Emerging Voices: Experiences of Underrepresented Asian Americans, Rutgers University Press, The mass migration of Kashmiri Hindus from Kashmir Valley began in November 1989 and accelerated in the following months. Every family has its departure story. Many families simply packed their belongings into thier cars and left under cover of night, without words of farewell to friends and neighbors. In some cases, wives and children left first, while husbands stayed behind to watch for the situation to improve; in other cases, parents sent their teenage sons away after hearing threats against them, and followed them days or weeks later. Many migrants report that they entrusted their house keys and belongings to the Muslim neighbors or servants and expected to return to their homes after a few weeks. Tens of thousands of Kashmiri Hindus left Kashmir Valley in the span of several months. There are also competing perspectives on the factors that led to the mass migration of Kashmiri Hindus during this period. Kashmiri Hindus describe migration as a forced exodus diven by Islamic fundamendalist elements in Pakistan that spilled across the Line of Control into the Kashmir Valley. They think that Kashmiri Muslims had acted as bystanders to violence by not protecting lives and properties fo the vulnerable Hindu community from the militant ... The mass migration, however, was understood differently by the Muslim religious majority in Kashmir. These Kashmiri Muslims, many of whom were committed to the cause of regional independence, believed that Kashmiri Hindus betrayed them by withdrawing their support from the Kashmiri nationalist movement and turning to the government of India for protection at the moment of ... This perspective is supported by claims, articulated by some prominent separatist political leaders, that the Indian government orchestrated the mass migration of the Kashmiri Hindu community in order to have a free hand to crack down on the popular uprising. These competing perspectives gave rise to mutual feelings of suspicion and betrayal—feelings that lingered between Kashmiri Muslims and Kashmiri Hindus and became more entrenched as time continued.
   • Bhatia, Mohita (2020), Rethinking Conflict at the Margins: Dalits and Borderland Hindus in Jammu and Kashmir, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, p. 9,  Despite witnessing a prolonged spell of insurgency including a few incidents of selective killings, Jammu was still considered to be a relatively safe refuge by the Hindu community of Kashmir, the Pandits. As a minuscule Hindu minority community in the Muslim-majority Kashmir (around 3 per cent of Kashmir's population), they felt more vulnerable and noticeable as insurgency peaked in Kashmir. Lawlessness, uncertainty, political turmoil along with a few target killings of Pandits led to the migration of almost the entire community from the Valley to other parts of the country
   • Bhan, Mona; Misri, Deepti; Zia, Ather (2020), "Relating Otherwise: Forging Critical Solidarities Across the Kashmiri Pandit-Muslim Divide.", Biography, 43 (2): 285–305, doi:10.1353/bio.2020.0030,  ...the everyday modes of relating that existed between Kashmiri Pandits and Muslims in the period leading up to the "Migration," as the Pandit departures have come to be called among Kashmiris, both Pandit and Muslim.
   • Duschinski, Haley (2018), "'Survial Is Now Our Politics': Kashmiri Pandit Community Identiy and the Politics of Homeland", Kashmir: History, Politics, Representation, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, pp. 172–198, 178–179,  The Kashmiri Pandit migration: (p. 178) The onset of the armed phase of the freedom struggle in 1989 was a chaotic and turbulent time in Kashmir (Bose, 2003). Kashmiri Pandits felt an increasing sense of vulnerability
   • Zutshi 2003, p. 318 Quote: "Since a majority of the landlords were Hindu, the (land) reforms (of 1950) led to a mass exodus of Hindus from the state. ... The unsettled nature of Kashmir's accession to India, coupled with the threat of economic and social decline in the face of the land reforms, led to increasing insecurity among the Hindus in Jammu, and among Kashmiri Pandits, 20 per cent of whom had emigrated from the Valley by 1950."
4. • Bose, Sumantra (2021), Kashmir at the Crossroads, Inside a 21st-Century Conflict, Yale University Press, pp. 119–120,  As insurrection gripped the Kashmir Valley in early 1990, the bulk – about 100,000 people – of the Pandit population fled the Valley over a few weeks in February–March 1990 to the southern Indian J&K city of Jammu and further afield to cities such as Delhi. ... The large-scale flight of Kashmiri Pandits during the first months of the insurrection is a controversial episode of the post-1989 Kashmir conflict.
   • Talbot, Ian; Singh, Gurharpal (2009), The Partition of India, New Approaches to Asian History, Cambridge University Press, pp. 136–137, ISBN 9780521672566,  Between 1990 and 1995, 25,000 people were killed in Kashmir, almost two-thirds by Indian armed forces. Kashmiris put the figure at 50,000. In addition, 150,000 Kashmiri Hindus fled the valley to settle in the Hindu-majority region of Jammu.
   • Metcalf & Metcalf 2006, p. 274The Hindu Pandits, a small but influential elite community who had secured a favourable position, first under the maharajas, and then under the successive Congress regimes, and proponents of a distinctive Kashmiri culture that linked them to India, felt under siege as the uprising gathered force. Of a population of some 140,000, perhaps 100,000 Pandits fled the state after 1990
5. Rai, Mridu (2021), "Narratives from exile: Kashmiri Pandits and their construction of the past", in Bose, Sugata; Jalal, Ayesha (eds.), Kashmir and the Future of South Asia, Routledge Contemporary South Asia Series, Routledge, pp. 91–115, 106, (p. 92) This compels consideration of a question, uncomfortable to ask about any displaced people, but forced by the nature of the polemic examined in this essay: how much responsibility do some Pandits bear, at least in their rhetoric, for their own excision from Kashmir? (p. 93) As Pandita tells us, his forebears of antiquity 'took the same route to enter Kashmir as their future generations took many times to escape from there, mostly due to religious persecution'.5 The inflection of his memoirs is, therefore, made apparent at the very outset. Informed by his community's recent displacement from Kashmir, he will remember for us their long history of victimization by Muslims. (p. 108) Certainly, Indian political parties of all shades, but especially the Hindu right-wing Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP, successor of the BJS) and its ideological parent the Rashtriya Swayamsevaka Sangh, have dredged the suffering of displaced Pandits for political gold. (p. 111) The reaction of several organizations claiming to represent displaced Kashmiri Pandits bears this out. In late July 2020, Satish Mahaldar, the chairman of a body called Reconciliation, Relief and Rehabilitation of Migrant Kashmiris, speaking ahead of the one-year anniversary of 5 August 2019, demanded not just the restoration of statehood to Jammu and Kashmir but also the return of its special status. The more prominent Kashmiri Pandit organizations outside the Valley were quick in their denunciation, claiming not only that Mahaldar's group did not represent displaced Pandits but, more damningly, that it was a creature of the separatist Hurriyat Conference.
6. Bose, Sumantra (2021), Kashmir at the Crossroads, Inside a 21st-Century Conflict, Yale University Press, p. 373,  In addition to the post-1990 displaced Pandits and the Pandits who continue to live in the Valley today, numerous KPs whose families migrated earlier from the Valley live in cities across India.
7. ^ Duschinski, Haley (2014), "Community Identity of Kashmiri Hindus in the United States", Emerging Voices: Experiences of Underrepresented Asian Americans, Rutgers University Press, p. 132,  Another key point of contention is the community's status as migrants. Kashmiri Hindus are not considered refugees because they have not crossed an international border to seek sanctuary in another country. This means that they are not covered by a well-defined body of international laws and conventions. They would like to be considered Internally Displaced Persons (IDPs) because they believe that this designation would give them some leverage to assert their basic rights in their dealings with the Indian state. The government of India refuses to grant them IDP status because it does not want to facilitate international involvement in its internal affairs.<<Footnote 22>> According to this logic, legally classifying the displaced Kashmiri Hindus as IDPs might attract international attention, initiate third-party involvement in the conflict, and prompt international scrutiny of the government's handling of the Kashmir situation. Kashmiri Hindus are thus classified as migrants, meaning that international agencies such as the UN High Commission for Refugees (UNHCR) and the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) do not play a role in their situation. Kashmiri Hindus vehemently dispute their classification as migrants because they believe that it carries the connotation that they have left their homeland of their own will, and are able to return freely, without threat of harm.
8. ^ Duschinski, Haley (2014), "Community Identity of Kashmiri Hindus in the United States", Emerging Voices: Experiences of Underrepresented Asian Americans, Rutgers University Press, p. 141, –<<Footnote 22>>: In 1995, the Kashmiri Samiti Delhi issued a petition to the National Human Rights Commission (NHRC) demanding that authorities extend to the Kashmiri Pandit community facilities and rights—such as nonrefoulement, humanitarian assistance, and the right to seek asylum—on the basis of their internal displacement. The petition also demanded that the government implement the recommendations of the representative of the UN secretary-general on IDPs and invited the NHRC to meet representatives of the displaced community. The NHRC issued a notice to the state government to respond to the petition. The government, in its response to the NHRC, argued that the Kashmiri Pandits are appropriately described as "migrants" since the word favors the community's return when the situation becomes more conducive. After reviewing the petition and the government's response to it. the NHRC indicated that the Kashmiri Pandits did not meet the typical definition of IDPs in light of the government's benevolent attitude toward them.
9. (a) Editors of Encyclopaedia Britannia, "Kashmir, region Indian subcontinent", Encyclopædia Britannica, retrieved 15 August 2019 {{citation}}: |last1= has generic name (help) (subscription required) Quote: "Kashmir, region of the northwestern Indian subcontinent ... has been the subject of dispute between India and Pakistan since the partition of the Indian subcontinent in 1947. The northern and western portions are administered by Pakistan and comprise three areas: Azad Kashmir, Gilgit, and Baltistan, the last two being part of a territory called the Northern Areas. Administered by India are the southern and southeastern portions, which constitute the state of Jammu and Kashmir but are slated to be split into two union territories. China became active in the eastern area of Kashmir in the 1950s and has controlled the northeastern part of Ladakh (the easternmost portion of the region) since 1962.";
   (b) "Kashmir", Encyclopedia Americana, Scholastic Library Publishing, 2006, p. 328, ISBN 978-0-7172-0139-6 C. E Bosworth, University of Manchester Quote: "KASHMIR, kash'mer, the northernmost region of the Indian subcontinent, administered partlv by India, partly by Pakistan, and partly by China. The region has been the subject of a bitter dispute between India and Pakistan since they became independent in 1947";
10. Osmańczyk, Edmund Jan (2003), Encyclopedia of the United Nations and International Agreements: G to M, Taylor & Francis, pp. 1191–, ISBN 978-0-415-93922-5 Quote: "Jammu and Kashmir: Territory in northwestern India, subject to a dispute between India and Pakistan. It has borders with Pakistan and China."
11. Rai 2004, p. 37: According to Walter Lawrence, the British settlement commissioner deputed to Kashmir in 1889, the Hindus comprised about 5 to 6 per cent of the population of the valley, the Sikhs about 0.5 per cent and the Muslims (including the Shias) about 93 per cent. The total population, according to him, amounted to 814,214. Walter Lawrence, The Valley of Kashmir (Srinagar: Chinar Publishing House, repr. 1992), p. 284. These numbers remained relatively steady as the 1941 census of India indicated that the Muslims comprised 93.6 per cent and the Hindus about 4 per cent of the total population of the valley. Census of India, Jammu and Kashmir, 1941.
12. Varshney, Ashutosh (2 March 2017), "India, Pakistan, and Kashmir: Antinomies of Nationalism", in Roy, Kaushik (ed.), Unconventional Warfare in South Asia, 1947 to the Present, Critical Essays on Warfare in South Asia, 1947 to the Present, Routledge, ISBN 9781351877091,   ... the land reforms program, even if intended by Abdullah to be entirely socioeconomic, was viewed in communal terms. The reason simply was that most landlords in Kashmir were Hindus and most peasants Muslim.
13. Rai 2004, p. 283; Bose 2013, pp. 250–251
14. ^ Zutshi 2003, p. 318: "Since a majority of the landlords were Hindu, the (land) reforms (of 1950) led to a mass exodus of Hindus from the state. ... The unsettled nature of Kashmir's accession to India, coupled with the threat of economic and social decline in the face of the land reforms, led to increasing insecurity among the Hindus in Jammu, and among Kashmiri Pandits, 20 per cent of whom had emigrated from the Valley by 1950."
15. Bazaz, Prem Nath (1976), The History of Struggle for Freedom in Kashmir: Cultural and Political, from the Earliest Times to the Present Day, National Committee for the Birth Centenary Celebrations of Qaid-i-Azam Mohammad Ali Jinnah, Ministry of Education, Government of Pakistan, p. 546, Thousands of Pandits, men, women, and children, have settled in different parts of India. 'The Kashmiri Pandit,' reported the Special Correspondent of Hindustan Times in June 1953, 'who is close to the Kashmiri Muslim personally, politically, and culturally, ... is equally panic-stricken. It is no mere accident that some 8000 Pandits have migrated to India since the inception of the new order.
16. Metcalf, Barbara D.; Metcalf, Thomas R. (2012), A Concise History of Modern India, Cambridge University Press, p. 274,  The year 1989 marked the beginning of a continuing insurgency, fuelled by covert support from Pakistan. The uprising had its origins in Kashmiri frustration at the state's treatment by Delhi. The imposition of leaders chosen by the centre, with the manipulation of local elections, and the denial of what Kashmiris felt was a promised autonomy boiled over at last in the militancy of the Jammu and Kashmir Liberation Front, a movement devoted to political, not religious, objectives. The Hindu Pandits, a small but influential elite community who had secured a favorable position, first under the maharajas and then under the successive Congress governments, and who propagated a distinctive Kashmiri culture that linked them to India, felt under siege as the uprising gathered force. Upwards of 100,000 of them left the state during the early 1990s; their cause was quickly taken up by the Hindu right. As the government sought to locate 'suspects' and weed out Pakistani 'infiltrators', the entire population was subjected to a fierce repression. By the end of the 1990s, the Indian military presence had escalated to approximately one soldier or paramilitary policeman for every five Kashmiris, and some 30,000 people had died in the conflict.
17. Talbot, Ian; Singh, Gurharpal (2009), The Partition of India, New Approaches to Asian History, Cambridge University Press, pp. 136–137, ISBN 9780521672566,  (Farooq Abdullah's) efforts to establish an all-India oppositional front for more autonomy resulted, first, in his dismissal, and then, in his return to power in alliance with Congress in the rigged assembly elections of June 1987. It was these elections, and the denial of the growing support of the Muslim United Front, that triggered the uprising in the Kashmir valley from 1987 onwards. Thereafter the separatist groups (Jammu and Kashmir Liberation Front and Hizbul Mujahideen) transformed decades of ethnic oppression into a generalised uprising against the Indian state. Between 1990 and 1995, 25,000 people were killed in Kashmir, almost two-thirds by Indian armed forces. Kashmirs put the figure at 50,000. In addition, 150,000 Kashmiri Hindus fled the valley to settle in the Hindu-majority region of Jammu. In 1991, Amnesty International estimated that 15,000 people were being detained in the state without trial.
18. Metcalf & Metcalf 2006, p. 274: "The Hindu Pandits, a small but influential elite community who had secured a favourable position, first under the maharajas, and then under the successive Congress regimes, and proponents of a distinctive Kashmiri culture that linked them to India, felt under siege as the uprising gathered force. Of a population of some 140,000, perhaps 100,000 Pandits fled the state after 1990"
19. ^ Hussain, Shahla (2018), "Kashmiri Visions of Freedom", Kashmir: History, Politics, Representation, Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, pp. 89–112, 105,  The rhetoric of aazadi did not hold the same appeal for the minority community. The rise of insurgency in the region created a difficult situation for the Kashmiri Hindu community, which had always taken pride in their Indian identity. Self-determination was not only seen as a communal demand, but as a secessionist slogan that threatened the security of the Indian state. The community felt threatened when Kashmiri Muslims under the flag of aazadi openly raised anti-India slogans. The 1989 targeted killings of Kashmiri Hindus who the insurgents believed were acting as Indian intelligence agents heightened those insecurities. In the winter of 1990, the community felt compelled to mass-migrate to Jammu, as the state governor was adamant that in the given circumstances he would not be able to offer protection to the widely dispersed Hindu community. This event created unbridgeable differences between the majority and the minority; each perceived aazadi in a different light.
20. Evans 2002, pp. 20, 23: "(p. 20) What occurred in 1990 that led to so many (Kashmiri) Pandits (KPs) leaving? The situation at the time was one of open revolt. The Jammu Kashmir Liberation Front (JKLF) launched its armed campaign for independence from India on 31 July 1988. Two powerful bombs exploded in Srinagar and, for the rest of the year, occasional JKLF attacks saw the security situation in the Kashmir Valley deteriorate. As the violence spread, Muslim–Hindu amity in Kashmir came under strain, particularly given the initial militant targeting of Hindu officials. During the course of 1989, civil disobedience and political violence by Kashmiri Muslims gathered pace, and the Indian government imposed central governor’s rule in late January 1990. Governor Malhotra Jagmohan faced a series of challenges, and the internal displacement of Pandits was but one of them. ... (p. 23) My own interviews with a number of KPs in Jammu, many of whom hold Pakistan responsible, suggest suspicions of ethnic cleansing or even genocide are wide of the mark. The two conspiracy theories already described are not evidence-based. As Sumantra Bose observes, those Rashtriya Swamy Sevak publications’ claims that large numbers of Hindu shrines were destroyed and Pandits murdered are largely false, to the extent that many of the shrines remain untouched and many of the casualties remain unsubstantiated. Equally, it is important to note that some incidents did take place."
21. Rai 2004, p. 286
22. Bose 2003, pp. 119–120: "As the uprising broke out across the Valley in early 1990, approximately one hundred thousand Pandits left their Valley homes for Jammu city and Delhi in a few weeks in February and March, in one of the most controversial episodes of the war in Kashmir."
23. ^ Evans 2002, p. 20: "In early 1990, large numbers of KPs began leaving the Kashmir Valley. Over 100,000 left in a few months; some 160,000 in total have left the Kashmir Valley since. Not all KPs have left; but a mere handful remain today. Most of the original 1990 migrants left for Jammu, where they lived in squalid refugee camps, to begin with, but, by 1997, most had moved on, either to proper homes in Jammu or to cities elsewhere in India. Conditions in the refugee camps were, and still are, grim."
24. ^ Talbot, Ian; Singh, Gurharpal (2009), The Partition of India, New Approaches to Asian History, Cambridge University Press, pp. 136–137, ISBN 9780521672566,  Between 1990 and 1995, 25,000 people were killed in Kashmir, almost two-thirds by Indian armed forces. Kashmirs put the figure at 50,000. In addition, 150,000 Kashmiri Hindus fled the valley to settle in the Hindu-majority region of Jammu.
25. ^ Evans 2002, p. 19: "Most Kashmiri Pandits living in the Kashmir Valley left in 1990 as militant violence engulfed the state. Some 95% of the 160,000-170,000 community left in what is often described as a case of ethnic cleansing."
26. Madan 2008, p. 25
27. "South Asia. India". The World Factbook - Central Intelligence Agency. 21 December 2021.{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: url-status (link)
28. Hussain, Shahla (2021), Kashmir in the Aftermath of the Partition, Cambridge University Press, p. 320, 321, ISBN 9781108901130,  The Counter-narrative of Aazadi: Kashmiri Hindus and Displacement of the Homeland (p. 320) The minority Hindu community of the Valley, which had always presented itself as a group of true Indian patriots wedded to their Indian identity, now found itself in an extreme dilemma as the tehreek-i-aazadi threatened their security. The community felt safer as a part of Hindu-majority India, as it feared political domination in Muslim-majority Kashmir. It had thus often opposed Kashmiri Muslim calls for self-determination, equating this with anti-nationalism.
29. Rai, Mridu (2021), "Narratives from exile: Kashmiri Pandits and their construction of the past", in Bose, Sugata; Jalal, Ayesha (eds.), Kashmir and the Future of South Asia, Routledge Contemporary South Asia Series, Routledge, pp. 91–115, 106, An important element in the recollections of many Pandits is the effect the killing in the early 1990s of a number of Pandit officials had in shaking their sense of security. Various groups of militants claim that their targets were Indian government 'agents' and so, in eliminating them, they were essentially waging war against the state. Contrariwise, Pandits insist that the targets being exclusively Hindu indicated a 'communal' threat. It is only common sense that not every Pandit could have been an informer or a spy. But what is perplexing is that while the connection of numerous Pandits with the state's intelligence apparatus is denied in discussions relating to their roles in Kashmir, it is well advertised when making demands upon the state's resources in Indian law courts. The latter became an important arena for shaping Pandit narratives. ... At any rate, these testimonies freely given in Indian courts corroborate the claim of militants that at least some Pandits did act as agents of the state in Kashmir; of course, this does not offer justification for killing them.
30. Bose, Sumantra (2021), Kashmir at the Crossroads, Inside a 21st-Century Conflict, Yale University Press, pp. 119–120, JKLF's series of targeted assassinations that began in August 1989 (see Chapter 1) included a number of prominent Pandits. Tika Lal Taploo, the president of the Hindu nationalist BJP's Kashmir Valley unit, was killed in September 1989, followed in November by Neelkanth Ganjoo, the judge who had sentenced the JKLF pioneer Maqbool Butt to death in 1968 (the execution was carried out in 1984). As the Valley descended into mayhem in early 1990, Lassa Koul, the Pandit director of the Srinagar station of India's state-run television, was killed on 13 February 1990 by JKLF gunmen. The murders of such high-profile members of the community may have spread a wave of fear among Pandits at large.
31. Snedden, Christopher (2021), Independent Kashmir: An Incomplete Aspiration, Manchester University Press, p. 132, Some other slogans were clearly directed against pro-India Kashmiri Pandits. ... by the end of January 1990, loudspeakers in Srinagar mosques were broadcasting slogans like 'Kafiron Kashmir chhod do
32. Hussain, Shahla (2021), Kashmir in the Aftermath of the Partition, Cambridge University Press, p. 320, 321, ISBN 9781108901130,  The polarized political positions that the two communities had adopted since 1947 reached a breaking point in the new political climate of the 1990s, when Kashmiri Muslims openly invoked anti-India slogans and demanded aazadi. As the new valorization of armed resistance gripped the region, targeted killings of prominent members of the Kashmiri Hindu community whom the JKLF insurgents believed to be Indian intelligence agents sent shivers down the spine of the minority community. Stories of Kashmiri Pandits, branded as "informers," and killed in their own homes or in their alleys, and survived by grieving wives and children, had a tremendous impact on the psyche of the minority community. Their fears were heightened as religious slogans merged with the cry for independence emerging from the mosques of Kashmir. Certain militant groups even wrote threatening letters to the Kashmiri Hindu community, asking them to leave the Valley.
33. Evans 2002, p.23: "P. S. Verma echoes this; his interviews with migrant Pandits found few who had actually been personally harmed or threatened to leave the Valley (and many who had been begged to stay by their Muslim neighbours). A research study conducted by postgraduate politics students at the University of Jammu in 2001 found that 2% of KPs surveyed had received threatening letters; however, over 80% had not received any form of direct threat. Nevertheless, as Verma states, most of these migrants ‘felt very much threatened in an atmosphere of unabated violence, particularly during January–February 1990 when the major exodus took place’. My own interviews with a number of KPs in Jammu, many of whom hold Pakistan responsible, suggest suspicions of ethnic cleansing or even genocide are wide of the mark."
34. Datta 2017, p. 61–63: "While most accounts of events in Kashmir featured militancy and demonstrations against the Indian state, few references are made to the Pandits. The slogans the Pandits refer to have never been reported or recorded officially at the time and suggest a gap between what was recorded and what the Pandits describe.... Yet conversations regarding the Pandit exodus were complicated by their insistence that the Pandits were not targeted by the Muslims. They denied hearing (p.63) the slogans, even those threatening women, from the demonstrations which the Pandits draw attention to." harvnb error: no target: CITEREFDatta2017 (help)
35. Evans 2002, p. 20: "Most KPs believe that they were forced out of the Kashmir Valley; whether by Pakistan and the militant groups it backed, or by Kashmiri Muslims as a community. Representing the latter variant, Pyarelal Kaul contends that the Pandit departure was a clear case of communal intimidation by Muslims, designed to expel Hindus from the Valley. Mosques ‘were used as warning centres. Threatening the Hindus and conveying to them what terrorists and many Muslims of Kashmir wanted to achieve.’"
36. Bhan, Mona; Duschinski, Haley; Zia, Ather (20 April 2018), "Introduction. 'Rebels of the Streets': Violence, Protest, and Freedom in Kashmir", in Duschinski, Haley; Bhan, Mona; Zia, Ather; Mahmood, Cynthia (eds.), Resisting Occupation in Kashmir, University of Pennsylvania Press, pp. 25–27, ISBN 9780812249781,  . Their stories of departure are deeply contested; while many in Kashmir view their departure from Kashmir as Governor Jagmohan Malhotra' grand design to exterminate Muslims once Kashmir's Hindu minority had fled the valley, many Kashmiri Pandits track the onset of Kashmir's armed rebellion in 1989 to a new brand of Islamic extremism, which in their view posed a grave threat to Kashmir's Hindu minority (Duschinski 2008).
37. Hussain, Shahla (2021), Kashmir in the Aftermath of the Partition, Cambridge University Press, p. 320, 321, ISBN 9781108901130,  In this violent and unstable atmosphere, rumors spread that the exodus of Kashmiri Hindus was the machinations of the state governor who planned to use unrestrained force to suppress Kashmiri Muslim resistance and thus viewed the presence of the Kashmiri Hindus in the neighborhoods as a hindrance to the army in quickly and efficiently carrying out its plan.'!" Many Kashmiri Muslims claimed to have "witnessed departing Pandits boarding vehicles organized by the state," and felt fearful about their own security. A senior Indian administrator, Wajahat Habibullah, posted in Kashmir at this critical juncture, denied the involvement of the government in a coordinated plan for Kashmiri Hindu departure. However, he emphasized that the state governor did little to stop the Pandits from leaving the Valley. Jagmohan remained adamant that he would not be able to offer protection to the Valley's widely dispersed Hindu community, and rejected Habibullah's suggestion to televise "the request of hundreds of Muslims to their Pandit compatriots not to leave the valley." Instead, the government reassured Pandits of their support in settling them in refugee camps in Jammu and paying the civil servants their salaries, if the community decided to leave
38. Ganguly, Sumit (1997), The Crisis in Kashmir: Portents of War; Hopes of Peace, Woodrow Wilson Center Series, Washington DC and Cambridge, UK: Woodrow Wilson Center Press and Cambridge University Press, p. 107, ISBN 9780521655668, However, two factors undermined the sense of security and safety of the pandit community in Kashmir. First, the governor hinted that the safety and security of the Hindu community could not be guaranteed. Second, the fanatical religious zeal of some of the insurgent groups instilled fear among the Hindus of the valley. By early March, according to one estimate, more than forty thousand Hindu inhabitants of the valley had fled to the comparative safety of Jammu.
39. Evans 2002, p. 22: "There is a third possible explanation for what happened in 1990; one that acknowledges the enormity of what took place, but that examines carefully what triggered KP migration: KPs migrated en masse through legitimate fear. Given the killings of 1989 and 1990, and the ways in which rumour spread fast in the violent conditions of early 1990, might KPs have been terrified by uncertainty as much as by direct threats? There was collective unease at the situation as it unfolded. While the numbers of dead and injured were low, militant attacks between 1988 and 1990 induced panic within the Pandit community. There was widespread fear and a sense of impending trouble, fuelled by extremist propaganda on both sides. By late March 1990, the ASKPC was appealing to the administration to assist Pandits in ‘shifting to Jammu’. The public rhetoric of some of the more Islamist militants in the Valley, with calls for an Islamic state, although aimed primarily at Indian rule, struck a chilling chord with KPs. This in turn sparked off an exodus, which was not actively combated by Governor Jagmohan’s administration (during whose tenure, almost 90% of the departures took place)."
40. Metcalf & Metcalf 2006, p. 274: "Their cause was quickly taken up by the Hindu right."
41. Hussain, Shahla (2021), Kashmir in the Aftermath of the Partition, Cambridge University Press, p. 323,  The Pandits' situation was further complicated by the indifference of Indian political parties, especially the Congress and the 1989-90 National Front government.' Kashmiri Pandits perceived themselves as "true patriots" who had "sacrificed greatly for their devotion to the Indian nation." As such, they saw the inability of the state to provide support in exile as a moral failure and a betrayal. This vacuum was filled by Hindu rightist groups, who, while advocating for Kashmiri Pandits, preyed on their insecurities and further alienated them from Kashmiri Muslims.
42. Verma, Saiba (2020), The Occupied Clinic: Militarism and Care in Kashmir, Duke University Press, p. 26, Although Kashmiri Muslims did not support violence against religious minorities, the exodus of Kashmiri Pandits (who are Hindus) and their unresolved status continues to be a pain often "weaponized" by the Indian state to cast Kashmiris Muslims as Islamic radicals.
43. Zutshi, Chitralekha (2019), Kashmir, Oxford University Press,  These developments subverted the popular nature of the insurgency, tarnishing the very real political grievances that underlay it with the brush of criminality and Islamic radicalism.
44. Verma, Saiba (2020), The Occupied Clinic: Militarism and Care in Kashmir, Duke University Press, p. 62,  Soon after Jammu and Kashmir became a disturbed area in 1990, the change registered in the landscape. Armed forces occupied protected forests, temples, orchards, and gardens. Cricket grounds became desiccated ovals in the middle of the city. Historical sites became interrogation centers; cinemas became military bunkers. Counterinsurgency tactics, such as sieges, crackdowns, and cordon-and-search operations, transformed village after village. Checkpoints, roadblocks, and identity checks became everyday realities.
45. Bhan, Mona; Duschinski, Haley; Zia, Ather (2018), "Introduction. 'Rebels of the Streets': Violence, Protest, and Freedom in Kashmir", in Duschinski, Haley; Bhan, Mona; Zia, Ather; Mahmood, Cynthia (eds.), Resisting Occupation in Kashmir, University of Pennsylvania Press, p. 26, &nbs;Since the mid-1990s, Kashmiri Pandits have become caught up in the nationalist movement more so than before, as the idea of return to homeland constitutes one of the main points in Modis BJP mandate. The manifesto emphasizes the BJP's long-standing commitment to the return of Kashmiri Pandits to "the land of their ancestors" with "full dignity, security and assured livelihood" (Bharatiya Janata Party 2014, 8). The recurring call for separate security zones for Kashmiri Pandits reveals the extent to which notions of security have become Hinduized in Kashmir. Community leaders of small but vocal and politically positioned groups such as Panun Kashmir, headquartered in Delhi and Bombay, have all along demanded a separate homeland for Kashmiri Pandits, carved out of the existing state of J&K. The BJP's return to power has reenergized such groups.
46. Hussain, Shahla (2021), Kashmir in the Aftermath of the Partition, Cambridge University Press, p. 323,  Some Kashmiri Pandits adopted a radical approach and organized the "Panun Kashmir" (Our Own Kashmir) movement, demanding a homeland carved out from the Valley. Panun Kashmir claimed that the entire Valley had originally been inhabited by Hindus, giving them a right to it in the present. The movement argued that to prevent the total disintegration of India, Kashmiri Pandits "who have been driven out of Kashmir in the past" or "who were forced to leave on account of the terrorist violence in Kashmir" should be given their own separate homeland in the Valley. The movement's slogan was "Save Kashmiri Pandits, Save Kashmir, and Save India. Kashmiri Hindus, according to its leaders, had borne the cross of Indian secularism for several decades and their presence had played a major role in the restoration of the Indian claim on Kashmir. The organization warned India that restoring any form of autonomy to the state would indirectly mean conceding the creation of an Islamic state. As historian Mridu (p. 324) Rai has argued, ironically, while "Panun Kashmir opposes demands for Aazadi as an illegitimate demand of Islamist separatists, their own territorial claims are no less separatist." The exclusionary nature of their organization was immediately visible from their maps, which depicted a Valley denuded of Muslim religious sites. As Rai argues, maps such as Panun Kashmir's are "fashioned to enable easy pleating into that of India, the status quo power in the Valley."
47. Evans 2002, p. 23: "Once it became clear that the government could not protect senior KP officials—and would pay their salaries in absentia—many other KPs in state employment decided to move. At the outset, few of these migrants expected their exile to last more than a few months."
48. Hussain, Shahla (2021), Kashmir in the Aftermath of the Partition, Cambridge University Press, p. 323,  Interestingly, themes of omission, anger, and betrayal are absent from the narratives of those Kashmiri Pandits who stayed in the Valley and refused to (p. 323) migrate. Even though life was extremely difficult without the support of their own community, their stories emphasize human relationships that transgressed the religious divide, and highlighted the importance of building bridges between communities. Pandits' experience of displacement varied depending on their class status. While the urban elite found jobs in other parts of India, lower-middle-class Hindus, especially those from rural Kashmir, suffered the most, many living in abject poverty. The local communities into which they migrated saw their presence as a burden, generating ethnic tensions between the "refugees" and the host community.' Adding to the tension, Kashmiri Hindus from the Valley, mostly Brahmans, had their own social and religious practices that differed from the Hindus of Jammu. They wanted to retain their own cultural and linguistic traditions, which made it difficult for them to assimilate into Jammu society.
49. Rai, Mridu (2021), "Narratives from exile: Kashmiri Pandits and their construction of the past", in Bose, Sugata; Jalal, Ayesha (eds.), Kashmir and the Future of South Asia, Routledge Contemporary South Asia Series, Routledge, pp. 91–115, 106, According to the Indian home ministry's annual report for 2009–10, 20 years after the exodus, there were 57,863 Pandit refugee families, of whom 37,285 resided in Jammu, 19,338 in Delhi, and 1,240 in other parts of the country. Countless writers have described the miserable conditions of the Pandits living in camps, especially those who are still languishing in those established in and around Jammu. Unwelcomed by their host communities, entirely deprived of privacy and basic amenities, many succumbed to depression, ageing-related diseases, and a sense of desperate helplessness. Needless to say, there were some who fared better – those with wealth and older connections – but for those many others with none of these advantages, it was as being plunged with no safety net. Ever since 1990, Indian politicians promised much and delivered next to nothing for the camp-dwellers.
50. Hussain, Shahla (2021), Kashmir in the Aftermath of the Partition, Cambridge University Press, p. 321,  Several displaced Kashmiri Pandits wrote autobiographies, novels, and poetry to record their experiences of violence and give their community an outlet to make sense of their forced "exile."
51. Hussain 2015, pp. 102, 103.
52. Faheem 2018, pp. 233, 234.
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70. "One election that wasn't rigged". The Economist. 10 October 2002. Election rigging got India into trouble in Jammu & Kashmir, its only Muslim majority state, but it will take more than one relatively fair election to get India out. Kashmiris took up arms against the Indian government after the state's 1987 elections, widely regarded as a stitch-up by the National Conference, the current ruling party.
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156. Evans 2002, pp. 20, 23: "(p. 20) What occurred in 1990 that led to so many (Kashmiri) Pandits (KPs) leaving? The situation at the time was one of open revolt. The Jammu Kashmir Liberation Front (JKLF) launched its armed campaign for independence from India on 31 July 1988. Two powerful bombs exploded in Srinagar and, for the rest of the year, occasional JKLF attacks saw the security situation in the Kashmir Valley deteriorate. As the violence spread, Muslim–Hindu amity in Kashmir came under strain, particularly given the initial militant targeting of Hindu officials. During the course of 1989, civil disobedience and political violence by Kashmiri Muslims gathered pace, and the Indian government imposed central governor’s rule in late January 1990. Governor Malhotra Jagmohan faced a series of challenges, and the internal displacement of Pandits was but one of them. ... (p. 23) My own interviews with a number of KPs in Jammu, many of whom hold Pakistan responsible, suggest suspicions of ethnic cleansing or even genocide are wide of the mark. The two conspiracy theories already described are not evidence-based. As Sumantra Bose observes, those Rashtriya Swamy Sevak publications’ claims that large numbers of Hindu shrines were destroyed and Pandits murdered are largely false, to the extent that many of the shrines remain untouched and many of the casualties remain unsubstantiated. Equally, it is important to note that some incidents did take place."
157. Rai 2004, p. 286
158. Bose 2003, pp. 119–120: "As the uprising broke out across the Valley in early 1990, approximately one hundred thousand Pandits left their Valley homes for Jammu city and Delhi in a few weeks in February and March, in one of the most controversial episodes of the war in Kashmir."
159. Duschinski 2008, p. 46.
160. Madan 2008, p. 25
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Bibliography

Books

• Bose, Sumantra (1997), The challenge in Kashmir: democracy, self-determination, and a just peace, New Delhi: Sage Publications, ISBN 978-0-8039-9350-1
• Bose, Sumantra (2003), Kashmir: Roots of Conflict, Paths to Peace, Harvard University Press, ISBN 978-0-674-01173-1
• Bose, Sumantra (2013), Transforming India, Harvard University Press, ISBN 978-0-674-72819-6
• On Uncertain Ground: Displaced Kashmiri Pandits in Jammu and Kashmir, Oxford University Press, 2017, ISBN 9780199466771
• Faheem, Farrukh (2018), "Interrogating the Ordinary: Everyday Politics and the Struggle for Azadi in Kashmir", in Duschinski, Haley; Bhan, Mona; Zia, Ather; Mahmood, Cynthia (eds.), Resisting Occupation in Kashmir, University of Pennsylvania Press, pp. 230–247, ISBN 978-0-8122-9496-5
• Hussain, Shahla (2015), "Kashmiri Visions of Freedom: The Past and the Present", in Zutshi, Chitralekha (ed.), Kashmir: History, Politics, Representation, Cambridge University Press, ISBN 978-1107181977
• Jagmohan (2006) . My Frozen Turbulence in Kashmir (7 ed.). Allied Publisher. ISBN 9788177649956.
• Madan, T. N. (2008), "Kashmir, Kashmiris, Kashmiriyat: An Introductory Essay", in Rao, Aparna (ed.), The Valley of Kashmir: The Making and Unmaking of a Composite Culture?, pp. 1–36
• Malik, Iffat (2005), Kashmir: Ethnic Conflict, International Dispute, Oxford University Press, ISBN 978-0-19-579622-3
• Metcalf, Barbara; Metcalf, Thomas R. (2006), A Concise History of Modern India (Cambridge Concise Histories), Cambridge and New York: Cambridge University Press. Pp. xxxiii, 372, ISBN 978-0-521-68225-1
• Rai, Mridu (2004), Hindu Rulers, Muslim Subjects: Islam, Rights, and the History of Kashmir, Princeton University Press/Permanent Black, ISBN 978-81-7824-202-6
• Tikoo, Colonel Tej K. (2013). Kashmir: Its Aborigines and Their Exodus. Lancer Publishers LLC. ISBN 978-1-935501-58-9.
• Pandit, T. N. (1 January 2005). Kashmiri Pandits: A Contemporary Perspective. APH Publishing. pp. 3, 9, 63–. ISBN 9788176488129.
• Swami, Praveen (2007), India, Pakistan and the Secret Jihad: The Covert War in Kashmir, 1947–2004, Routledge, ISBN 978-1-134-13752-7
• Wilhelm, Sandhya (2010). Can India Give Up Kashmir: An Option or a Risk? (PDF) (Thesis). Georgetown University.
• Zutshi, Chitralekha (2003), Languages of Belonging: Islam, Regional Identity, and the Making of Kashmir, C. Hurst & Co. Publishers, ISBN 978-1-85065-700-2

Journals

• Evans, Alexander (2002). "A departure from history: Kashmiri Pandits, 1990–2001". Contemporary South Asia. 11 (1): 19–37. doi:10.1080/0958493022000000341. ISSN 0958-4935. S2CID 145573161.
• Duschinski, Haley (2008). ""Survival Is Now Our Politics": Kashmiri Hindu Community Identity and the Politics of Homeland". International Journal of Hindu Studies. 12 (1): 41–64. doi:10.1007/s11407-008-9054-z. ISSN 1022-4556. JSTOR 40343840. S2CID 143490357.

Further reading

• The Administrator, Volume 35, Lal Bahadur Shastri National Academy of Administration, 1990, pp. 69–73

External links

• Quotations related to Exodus of Kashmiri Hindus at Wikiquote

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• Ethnic cleansing in Asia
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