A Kashmiri Muslim family runs for cover as protesters clash with Indian security forces in Srinagar, Indian controlled Kashmir, Sunday, July 10, 2016. Dar Yasin /Press Association. All rights reserved.What is the difference between a funeral and a demonstration? In Kashmir, there is none. As the killing of 30 civilian protestors by the armed forces of the state in the last two days shows, in Kashmir, every funeral is a demonstration and every demonstration is a funeral.
Every time people gather in any significant protest against the Indian state — which claims the territory of Kashmir in its entirety and holds on to two thirds of it by the force of nearly 700000 troops, making it the world’s most militarised zone — people are killed by the bullets of the security forces; and every time there is a funeral of those who protest and resent the Indian state, massive crowds gather to demonstrate. And so the cycle repeats itself. But is the world listening?
The jingoism of ‘India rising’, which has a great hold on the hearts and minds of the Indian middle classes and now increasingly pervades the discourse in the west too, has no space for human rights, or indeed, any sense of humanity. Masses of Indian public are fed the hypernationalist narratives recycled in the media which only repeat “Kashmir is an integral part of India”. They are utterly unable to comprehend the mechanics of an occupation which is carried out in the name of a ‘democracy’.
