Minor Children and the
Struggle for Freedom of Kashmir (JR 224)
Introduction
Children are the worst sufferers in a
war zone. They are deprived of a normal childhood and are most times afraid and
under stress. The children of Indian Occupied Kashmir, had to suffer even more
as the Indians were and are aping Israeli policies and procedures, these allow
imprisonment of children and use of brutal police force against children. The
use of pellet guns by Indian Occupation forces has resulted in loss of eyesight
and serious damages to the eyes to numerous children. 107,775 have been orphaned since 1989
The children of Kashmir are facing violence and armed conflicts. In this
light it is important to remember the Optional Protocol to
the Convention relating to the Rights of the Child,
regarding the involvement of children in armed conflicts of 2000, in order to
gain an understanding of the difficult problems that children growing up in
violence are facing. Although this refers to child soldiers, it also concerns
ongoing state violence, which children are undeniably facing every day if their
region is at war.
The main issues children are facing in the region currently are violence
and lack of education. As stated by a report created by
Indian economists and activists, boys have been abducted during
midnight raids by the security forces, and girls and women have been molested
during nighttime raids by officers Although thorough, the report does not include
any video interview evidence from ordinary people that the Indian researchers
encountered. However, there is a reason for this: parents fear speaking about
it in the event that the raids are filed in the Public Security Act cases. The
parents’ statement of their boys’ disappearance could lead to their arrest due
to interference with state security. Indeed, the raids have installed fear on
Kashmiris.
Malnutrition
Furthermore, Indian researchers report on lack of
food, milk and basic needs throughout the population. This has quite negative
effects on children, who are still growing, in need of proper resources for their
growth. In regards to health, people have been prevented from travelling to the
hospitals, too unsafe considering the current situation. The report has been a useful source of
information in a country which is currently facing a media blackout, with journalists
unable to travel within the region.
Education
The second main issue that children have been
facing is lack of education. Around mid-August 2019, Indian authorities ordered
the primary schools to reopen, after having closed them on August 5. They are
still opening schools, where restrictions no longer apply. Due to the ongoing
conflict, which in practice translates itself to conflicts in the streets and
clashes with security forces, parents have been reluctant to bring their
children to school. In fact, the lack of safety has lead some parents to state that
education is less important than the safety of their children. Children need a
safe environment in which they feel comfortable in order to attend school and
be in a working environment.
Besides human and economic
losses, education has taken a major hit in Indian-administered Kashmir due to
conflict and clampdowns. On Feb. 24, nearly 1.2 million students attended
classes for the first time in almost seven months, since India revoked limited
autonomy and divided the region into two centrally administered units. But
analysts say, in an unpredictable situation, there was no guarantee of their
proper functioning. Since the 2008 civilian uprising, the schools and business
establishment have seen many shutdowns in the region. Mohammad Hamza, 12, a
student of standard 6 class, said he was preparing for a class test scheduled
last year Aug. 5, when the government ordered the closure of all educational
institutions. No reason was given. Young Hamza least understood what was
happening around as he was grappling with a mathematical problem.“The chaos and
uncertainty soon gripped me. I saw for the first time my mother was not
interested in my class tests, but my safety,” he told Anadolu Agency. Following
the controversial move, authorities on two occasions announced the reopening of
schools. But students stayed away amid the ongoing restrictions and concerns
among parents about the children's safety.“I thought bombs are being dropped
and my school will be in rubbles. I remember helicopters and fighters zooming
on skies during the whole night. I was unable to sleep,” said Hamza. Since
Aug.5 last year, Hamza said he has remained confined to his home only.“There
was no communication with the friends or with any of relatives due to
commination clampdown. The only shelter was to sit in a corner of a room,"
he added.
For the child every single
day was boring, with no activity, just staring from windows to find someone to
talk with. Last time in 2016, soon after the killing of a militant commander
Burhan Wani, educational institutions remained closed for eight months as
unrest plagued the region. While at that time, schools in South Kashmir bore
the maximum brunt, during the last seven months, the whole Kashmir Valley has
witnessed continuous closure of schools.
Due to uncertainty looming
large, parents refused to send children to schools, even though the government
tried to open schools. “The day used, to begin with, uncertainty and end with
uncertainty. Which parent in the world would send children to school in such a
situation?” asked Shaheena Akhter, a mother.
"We want to secure the
future of children. We cannot afford more loss to their education," he
said. Io compensate for the loss, the number of academic days has been
increased from 180 to 200 for primary and 210 days for middle classes for the
year 2020.For now, Hamza is back to school, studying and playing with his
friends. But in current times ravaged with uncertainty and marked by
clampdowns, nobody knows how long the optimism lasts.
Schools: Aug., 19, 2019: The main government offices and some
schools in Indian-administered Kashmir have reopened after a two-week shutdown
amid fear and tension over the government's decision to revoke the region's autonomy.
Government employees on Monday resumed their duties at the Civil Secretariat,
the headquarters of the Indian administration, following directions issued last
week. The directions also included the reopening of nearly 200 primary schools
in selected areas of the disputed region. Most schools, however, were empty as wary
parents refused to send their children to school while the situation remains
tense amid low-intensity and sporadic protests. . The government was trying to
"manufacture normalcy" by risking the lives of younger children amid
the worst crisis Kashmir Valley had witnessed in decades. Nasir
Mir, an engineer in Srinagar, told Al Jazeera that the situation was not ready
for schools to open. "The government wants children in
uniforms to be video graphed for the media and sell it as normalcy in
Kashmir," he said
Students:
Nov., 30, 2019:
Access to mobile, landline and internet networks were suspended
along with a complete lockdown in the Indian administered Kashmir region on
August 5, 2019 After more than two
months, the government partially restored
the communication blockade. Internet access has been restored in some institutions and new rules force companies to give up their privacy and refrain from the use of social networks if
they want to use the Internet. However, regular citizens still
have no access to Internet. The Internet ban is taking a toll on the 48,000
Kashmiri students who are appearing at different public examinations. Many
students were in the dark regarding their examination dates. Because of the
“Security Measures” taken after the abrogation of Special Status of Jammu and
Kashmir allotted under Article 370 of Indian Constitution, schools were closed
and students could not prepare fully for examinations. They worry about
qualifying for the upcoming examination. https://globalvoices.org/2019/11/29/inside-kashmirs-internet-blockade-video-report-with-kashmiri-students-affected-by-the-crisis/
Education and Kashmir: Dec., 2. 2019:
Already delayed by four months, the end of semester examination is yet to take
place in most of the graduate courses in Kashmir. “For now there is no formal
date sheet for the examination. Our exams were to be completed in late August
of this year and so our graduation but still we are waiting for the exams to
take place,” another student media student Zulkilfah Shakeel told Anadolu
Agency.The delay in examinations has cost students in different ways, some are
not able to prepare for entrance examinations. Some are not able to go for
internships and some are not able to go abroad for higher studies because of
their pending degrees. The students, particularly from rural areas, received a
setback in their prospectus of educational career when administrative orders
were issued to close hostels of the varsities across Kashmir Aug. 4. The
hostels of Kashmir are still closed for rural students who are facing immense
hardships in postgraduate exams which were notified recently. For now the
students find it hard to appear for exams although the administration at the
varsity level asked students to appear for exams in satellite campuses but
students from South Kashmir told Anadolu Agency it does not make any
difference. They have to travel the same distance to the satellite campus or
the main campus of Kashmir University. He also said because of no
transportation, students are suffering badly. “I had to travel for four hours
to reach to Kashmir University to appear in my first paper. It is very
difficult situation,” the student said. The classwork at schools, colleges and
universities of Kashmir has remained suspended after the Aug. 5 lockdown which
severely affected the education sector of the region. “These four months have
been hard. We couldn’t read anything at our homes. The mind was already occupied
with external disturbances and volatile situations,” Sanam Mukhtar, a high
school student told Anadolu Agency. As the condition of businesses, trade,
health care and livelihood remains dismal in the region but the future of
education of children stare cluelessly at a blank with dejection and
helplessness among them. https://www.aa.com.tr/en/asia-pacific/lockdown-puts-education-in-kashmir-on-back-burner/1660514
Cost of struggle to children
Children orphaned: Jan., 4, 2019: As per the reports, over 31 children have been killed in
2018, while many human rights organizations have put the number of orphans in
Kashmir as more than 30,000 in last three decades. The year 2018 has been the
deadliest in last one decade, with highest number of killings and increased
number of incidents of violence. In absence of the political initiatives on the
disputed nature of the region, it has only been the violence that has grown
over the years, and it has left countless orphans dotting the bloodied
political canvas of Kashmir’s tragic history. December 2018 has been the
deadliest year in Indian Occupied Kashmir
violation of child rights by India in
Kashmir Feb., 4,
2019:: also
needs to be specifically highlighted at different forums attaching great
significance to this issue. According to a report by Jammu Kashmir Coalition of
Civil Society (JKCCS), children in the occupied valley are the direct target of
Indian forces who, with complete impunity, have exterminated 318 of them in the last
15 years. One could hardly disagree that ghastly incidents such as
abduction, rape and murder of eight-year-old Asifa Bano and blinding of
18-month-old Hiba Nisar through pellet guns by Indian troops could not have
gone almost unnoticed, were they highlighted effectively under various
international child rights conventions and protocols.
2019 killings: July, 4,
2019: The first six months of 2019
recorded 271 killings in Jammu and Kashmir in various incidents of violence,
which include 43 civilians, 120 militants and 108 Indian armed forces
personnel, a human rights group Jammu Kashmir Coalition of Civil Society said
on Wednesday. JKCCS said that among the 43 civilians killed in the first half
of 2019, 14 were killed by Indian armed forces and police, 12 were killed by
unidentified gunmen, 8 civilians died after falling victim of cross LOC
shelling in the border areas of J&K, 5 civilians were killed by suspected
militants, 3 died due to an explosion while the agency responsible for the
killing of 2 civilians remains unknown – as both police and militants blamed
each other for these two killings.“Among the 43 civilians killed, 9 were
minors
July cost: Aug., 1, 2019: In occupied Kashmir, Indian martyred 11 Kashmiris including a minor girl
and a woman during the last month of July. According to the data issued by the
Research Section of Kashmir Media Service, today, during the month, 80 people
were critically injured due to the use of brute force and firing of pallets,
bullets and teargas shells by Indian police and paramilitary personnel against
peaceful protesters in the territory.
Minor arrests after Aug 5
Farhan Farooq, a skinny 13-year-old with a tuft of black
hair, was the youngest. Suddenly, a police vehicle came to a stop next to them
and armed officers jumped out in the August twilight. They bundled the three
friends into the car, one of the other boys recalled later. Farhan began to
cry. For the next week, Farhan’s family said, he was held in a jail cell at the
local police station in this Kashmiri town 10 miles outside of Srinagar, part
of a sweeping crackdown by Indian authorities in the wake of the government’s
decision to strip Kashmir of its autonomy and statehood.
Farhan is among some 3,000 people detained in Kashmir
since Aug. 5, according to an estimate from a
senior local government official who spoke on the condition of anonymity
because he was not authorized to discuss the matter. It is unclear how many of
the detainees were minors, but The Washington Post has confirmed that at least five Kashmiris younger than 18
have been taken into detention since the start of the crackdown.
“There is an atmosphere of fear in every house,” said
Farhan’s mother, Nazia, adding that she did not know why her son was detained.
“If they can pick up children, they can do anything.”
Farhan and his friend Junaid Shafi Mir, 17, picked up on Aug. 5,
were held in a cell with four others, with new detainees arriving and leaving
each day, Junaid said. On the second day of their detention, he said, the two
boys were asked to tell the police the whereabouts of another boy. When Junaid said
he didn’t know the boy, an officer hit him with a wooden baton five times on
his knuckles and palms, he recalled.
Nazia, Farhan’s \ mother, said that she came to see her son
every day and that officers sometimes let her speak to him. “He would cry and
ask me to take him home,” she said. “It was very difficult to see him like
that.”
Raids and detentions were still underway in recent days. About
11:30 p.m. on Aug. 24, Nisar Ahmad Mir, who is not
related to Junaid, was awakened by a voice claiming to be a local cleric,
asking him to open the gate to his home. Half a dozen armed policemen jumped over the wall and said they were looking for his
youngest son, 17-year-old Danish, he said. They whisked the boy away.Two days
later Danish had still not returned.
The Post confirmed two more cases in Srinagar in which police
detained minors.
Nowsheena Sheikh, 17,
said her husband, Aquib, also 17, was detained on Aug. 22 when he left home to buy milk. The following day police told her he was being held at
Srinagar’s central jail but did not give details of any charges against him. “I’m scared that they may transfer him out of the state,” said
Sheikh, one of dozens of people who gathered at the city’s main prison complex
on a recent morning searching for information about their relatives. “How will
I ever find him then?”Her fears are not unfounded. One woman began sobbing
after a guard handed her a note indicating that her relative had been moved to
a jail in Uttar Pradesh, more than 600 miles away. She left immediately,
clutching her 4-year-old daughter.
Some of the detentions are taking place under Kashmir’s controversial
Public Safety Act, a state law that allows local officials to order that people
be held for up to two years without charges or judicial review for reasons of
national security.
Children : Aug., 31, 2019: among some 3,000
people detained in Kashmir since Aug. 5,
It is unclear how many of the detainees were minors, but The Washington
Post has confirmed that at least five Kashmiris under the age of 18 were taken
into detention in the weeks since the start of the crackdown.
Children detained : Sep.,24,2019: https://www.bbc.com/news/av/world-asia-india-49772269/the-detained-children-of-kashmir video of children being detained by Indian Occupation
Forces in Indian Occupied Kashmir #FreeKashmir
#SaveKashmir. https://tribune.com.pk/story/2063006/3-helpless-kashmiri-families-fear-children-occupied-valley-report/ , Thousands of Kashmiri
men – including minors – have
been arrested in the name of maintaining order during nocturnal raids by Indian
occupying forces. The BBC spoke to 17 Kashmiri families who said
many children were illegally detained in the Indian Occupied Kashmir (IOK)
by Indian forces. The British broadcaster interviewed some of the victims –
with their faces hidden as they fear reprisals from Indian forces – who were
still trying to forget the ordeal they went through. “We were beaten up at the
camp and told, ‘you throw stones (at us), you seek freedom, what kind of
freedom do you seek?’ I wished for death, so I didn’t have to watch
the children being tortured,” said a Kashmiri man who was detained along with
his 16-year-old son. He said they were picked up by the Indian army and then
locked up at a police station for six days. “What could I do? I was powerless.”
His son was badly affected by what happened to him and his father.“I
feel very scared when it gets dark. I stay indoors. I can’t eat food or sleep
at night. I am scared they will come back again,” said the boy.
Lawyer Mir Urfi told the BBC how basic human rights were being “totally”
neglected in the valley. “People are arrested, they are kept in custody, be
it juveniles or be it majors, without legal justification, without
being given access to their families, without being given access to legal aid.
That is a basic human right that is available to every human being on this
planet. And that is being totally denied to the Kashmiris,” she said. Another
Kashmiri woman told the story of her 14-year-old son who was picked up by the
Indian police in the dark. “They (Indian police) came around midnight. They
took my husband away. Then they asked us to produce our son in exchange for my
husband’s release,” said the woman. With weeks into the crackdown, the report
continued, many Kashmiri families feared that their children might be next.
Minors detained: Oct., 2, 2019: Indian authorities in occupied Kashmir have
detained 144 minors, including a nine-year-old, since the
government removed the region's special status in August, a police list seen by
AFP showed on Tuesday. Sixty of the minors are under 15, according
to the document submitted to a committee appointed by India's Supreme Court to
look into allegations of illegal detentions. Reasons given by the police for
detaining the minors include stone pelting, rioting and causing damage to
public and private property, the committee said in its report. https://www.dawn.com/news/1508397/9-year-old-among-144-minors-detained-in-occupied-kashmir
Afaan:
Oct., 15, 2019: Afaan, spent a fortnight in a prison in Indian
occupied Jammu and Kashmir (IOK), after police booked him under a stringent
Public Safety Act (PSA). He was charged of protesting against Indian decision
of revoking the special status to the region. A fortnight in a prison cell has
completely changed Afaan, says his father Manzoor Ahmed Ganai. The
Juvenile Justice Committee of the State High Court has confirmed the arrest of
144 juveniles. “He (Afaan) is very depressed and frightened. His whole body
aches and there are visible scars on his back,” Ganai, told Anadolu Agency. A report prepared
by the IOK Coalition of Civil society (JKCCS) and the Association of Parents of
Disappeared Persons (APDP), mentions how the detention of children was adding
to the chaos. .https://tribune.com.pk/story/2080010/torture-detention-children-adds-rage-kashmir/
Children:
Oct., 19, 2019:
Children in Kashmir are prevented from accessing urgent medical care. Basic
necessities — including baby food, milk and medicines are in short supply.
Parents are not sending their children to school for fear they will be injured,
detained or killed and have no way of communicating with them. Armed
forces have illegally detained Kashmiri children and abused them, physically
and sexually. Children have been shot in the eye by soldiers firing pellet guns
and even marble slingshots. A 17-year-old boy recently died of tear gas and
pellet gun injuries. Women in labor cannot access obstetric care
for safe delivery, putting their newborns at risk. Fathers are randomly
detained by the military; many disappear, leaving children behind. Local
children’s organizations are being paralyzed by the blackout and lockdown while
international organizations tasked with promoting children’s well-being, like
UNICEF and Save the Children, have yet to initiate meaningful programs to
address this crisis https://www.insidesources.com/children-are-the-largest-casualty-of-the-kashmir-crisis/
Blinded children: Oct., 30, 2019:“Watching cartoons on TV, playing with my friends on the street,
reading books for hours — this is what I dream of now,” says nine-year-old Asif
Ahmad Sheikh, a Class 5 student from Anantnag.“I used to teach sewing and
tailoring to girls in my village, but not anymore. Because of the injuries, I
could not write my class 10 board exam,” says 17-year-old Ulfat Hameed, a Class
10 student from Baramulla.“When I
went to a hospital in Srinagar, there were so many people that the doctors sent
me back home as they did not have beds available,” says Bilal Ahmad Bhat, 17,
another student from Baramulla. https://www.dawn.com/news/1513749?fbclid=IwAR2UMEnMz84kpK9IbkgtIEyefxDn0cQKR1AdKVReUfVraG8a_96vMZuIt5c
De-radicalization camps for children: Jan.,
18, 2020: Top Indian general had
suggested putting young Kashmiri children in “de-radicalization camps” The statement, which referred to Gen Rawat's
remarks at the Raisina Dialogue 2020, added that as a perpetrator of “unabated
state-terrorism in the Indian Occupied Jammu & Kashmir (IOK)”, India is in
no position to pontificate on the issue of terrorism. https://www.dawn.com/news/1528918/fo-condemns-indian-generals-remarks-on-sending-kashmiri-children-to-deradicalisation-camps. Concentration camps: Jan., 18, 2020: In occupied Kashmir, India has planned to set up Nazi
type concentration camps for the Kashmiri youth to starve, torture and kill
them. A clear indication of the plan has been given by warmonger former Indian
Army Chief and incumbent Chief of Defence Staff, General Bipin Rawat, while
addressing a conference in New Delhi. He said that young Kashmiri children are
being radicalized and they need to be identified and put in de-radicalisation
camps. Rawat also claimed that Indian forces could not be blamed
for injuries caused by pellet guns and that radicalised stone-pelters were
“more dangerous” than the pellet guns. By emphasizing the need to deal with
heavy hand in occupied Kashmir, General Rawat has pointed towards the Indian
design to step up state terrorism in the territory. All Parties Hurriyat
Conference and other liberation organizations in their statements have said
that in the name of de-radicalization, the Kashmiri youth would be tortured in
new camps. They said that General Bipin Rawat’s warning was a depiction of
India’s militaristic approach towards the Kashmir dispute and was aimed at
making the Kashmiri youth to shun their struggle. The organizations said New
Delhi is using all brutal methods including torture to crush the Kashmiris’
liberation movement and bully them into accepting its illegal occupation of
Jammu and Kashmir. They pointed out that despite killing over 95,000 innocent
Kashmiris since 1989, Indian troops have failed to subdue the Kashmiri people’s
resolve for securing freedom from the Indian yoke. Meanwhile, as the Juma
congregational prayers culminated, people took to the streets in Srinagar,
Badgam, Pulwama, Tral, Doda and other areas and held forceful anti-India
demonstrations. The protesters raised high-pitched pro-freedom and anti-India
slogans https://kmsnews.org/news/2020/01/17/india-plans-nazi-type-concentration-camps-in-iok-2/. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eXYZPJ03p2U
HRW: Jan., 16,2020: The New York-based Human Rights Watch has criticized the
Indian government for gross human rights violations including arrests, torture
and communication blackout after abrogation of Kashmir’s special status in
August, last year. Human Rights Watch in its World Report 2020 posted on its
website said, Indian authorities also failed to protect religious minorities,
used draconian sedition and counter-terrorism laws to silence peaceful dissent,
and invoked foreign funding regulations and other laws to discredit and muzzle
nongovernmental organizations, critical of government actions or policies. “ The report said, “Prior to its actions in
Jammu and Kashmir, the government deployed additional troops …, shut down the
internet and phones, and arbitrarily detained thousands of Kashmiris, including
political leaders, activists, journalists, lawyers, and potential protesters, including
children. Hundreds remain in detention without charge or under
house arrest to prevent protests.” It said that the Indian government blocked
opposition politicians, foreign diplomats, and international journalists from
independent visits to occupied Kashmir. “The Indian government’s actions in
Kashmir have led to loss of livelihood and access to education.
independent recommendations, including by United Nations experts, the India
government did not review or repeal the Armed Forces Special Powers Act, which
gives soldiers effective immunity from prosecution for serious human rights
abuses. The law is in force in occupied Kashmir and in several states in northeast
India. The HRW said that in November, following a petition by child rights
activists, the Indian Supreme Court sought a detailed report from the juvenile
justice committee of occupied Kashmir High Court on the detention of children
and other abuses during the lockdown imposed since August. The committee earlier
submitted a police list of 144 detained children, the youngest being 9,
it added. https://kmsnews.org/news/2020/01/15/hrw-condemns-indian-government-over-atrocities-in-iok/
