According to a J&K government report, 219 members of the community had been killed in the region between 1989 and 2004 but none thereafter. This article is protected. Read | Kashmiri Pandits observe Holocaust Day to mark 30 years of mass exodus from Valley. [15], A historically contested region, Northern India was subject to attack from Turkic and Arab regimes from the eighth century onwards, but they generally ignored the mountain-circled Kashmir Valley in favour of easier pickings elsewhere. The Exodus of Kashmiri Pandits Ghulam Mohammad Shah came into power after snatching the position from his brother-in-law Farooq Abdullah and became [65] The Mata Kheerbhawani[66] temple shrine in Srinagar, considered one of the holiest Hindu shrines, saw the largest gathering of Kashmiri Pandits in the Kashmir valley in 2012. Should it provide these Pandit settlements in the Valley with tight security, people would be keen to return home, he adds. Advertisement. Exodus came with a night-long hysteria. [38][39][40], In 2009 the Oregon Legislative Assembly passed a resolution to recognise 14 September 2007, as Martyrs Day to acknowledge ethnic cleansing and campaigns of terror inflicted on non-Muslim minorities of Jammu and Kashmir by terrorists seeking to establish an Islamic state. They were assured that once the massacre in Kashmir was completed and the movement (for self-determination) curbed, they would be sent back to That night, the politically-disturbed Valley reverberated with war cries, communal calls, and threats to Pandits. What do we know about him? PM Rajiv Gandhis tenure ended on 2nd December 1989. More than 500000 Kashmiri Pandits migrated during the period of few weeks in 1990. According to P.K.Verma, "Education was a common thread that bound together this pan Indian elite" and almost all the members of these communities could read and write English and were educated beyond school. As for those Pandits who left the Valley, many were put up in tented accommodation in camps in Jammu and New Delhi initially and subsequently in townships in these cities. The KPSS has placed the number of Kashmiri Pandits killed by militants from 1990 to 2011 at 399, the majority during [35] The government has reported on the terrorist threats to Pandits still living in the Kashmir region. WebGenocide of Kashmiri Pandits. Major media outlets have that the kidnapping was a fake one as the kidnapping took place just after 5 days Sayeed took the office. It appears to have archaic features that suggest it is the oldest form of Kashmiri folk singing. [30] Other authors have suggested a higher figure for the exodus, ranging from the entire population of over 150,000,[31] to 190,000 of a total Pandit population of 200,000,[32] to a number as high as 800,000. The 1989 capitulation to the JKLF in the kidnapping of Mufti Sayeeds daughter set the stage for the next decade. It was evident that Kashmiri Muslims wanted us to leave the Valley, Ashok Dhar, who left Baramulla for Jammu on February 2, 1990, told The Diplomat. [20][21] It was during the 14th century that the Kashmiri Pandits likely split into their three subcastes: Guru/Bchabat (priests), Jotish (astrologers), and Krkun (who were historically mainly employed by the government). Jammu, UPDATED: Oct 8, 2021 18:18 IST. The truth, many commentators have concluded, may have been somewhere in the middle. What happened in January 1990 is bitterly contested. Many Pandits celebrated the Indian government move as they believe it will pave the way for their return to the Valley. Tens of thousands of Kashmiris and Indian security personnel have lost their lives in the violence that engulfed the region. A lot has changed since then but the more things change the more they remain the same. Socially and morally too the court and the country had sunk to the depths of degradations. WebMaybe. Neel Kanth Ganjoo, a retired judge who had sentenced Maqbool Bhat to death, was shot dead outside the J&K High Court in Srinagar on November 4. The Jammu & Kashmir Liberation Front (JKLF) stepped up its activities, and the hanging of the militant leader Maqbool Bhat in 1984 added to the sense of foreboding. Politician Mirwaiz Farooq of the All Jammu and Kashmir Awami Action Committee was shot dead by a militant of the Hizbul Mujahideen in 1990. The Kashmiri Muslims were instructed to identify Pandit homes so they could be systematically targeted for conversion or killing. Pandits were given a choice: convert to Islam, leave the Valley, or perish. He announced that if they chose to stay back, he would not be able to guarantee their safety. Play an active role in shaping our journalism by becoming a member. Caps were worn, as well as a type of turban referred to as a shirahshata, while footwear consisted of leather shoes and boots, worn with socks. The mass exodus of the Kashmiri Pandits began. Consequently, riots broke out in Jammu and Kashmir. Successive governments in New Delhi and Srinagar have attempted to draw displaced Pandits back to the Valley. Anantnag, the constituency of then Congress leader Mufti Mohammad Sayeed, bore the brunt of the violence. On January 21, the CRPF gunned down 160 Kashmiri Muslim protesters at the Gawkadal Bridge, which has come to be known as the worst massacre in the long history of the conflict in Kashmir. Instead, the notorious governor said that if the Pandits decided to leave, refugee camps had been set up for them and the departing civil servants would be continued to be paid their salaries. The published threat, however, came nearly three months after one of the darkest nights in Jammu and Kashmir 19 January 1990 observed as the Exodus Day by the Kashmiri Hindu community. (Or if they're ordered by the regime to create intentional tension/chaos. Governor Jagmohan is criticised for not guaranteeing the safety of Kashmiri Pandits fleeing the Valley and for not stopping them with assurance of security. The exodus took place at the same time that the BJP was upping the ante across northern India, and over the years, the plight of Kashmiri Pandits has become a potent Hindutva issue. In late 1989, Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) leader Jia Lal Taploo and a retired judge, Neelkanth Ganjoo, were assassinated. As per the estimates, 650 Pandits were killed during this time. [36][37], Some Hindus across India tried to help the Pandits. At best, the younger generation of Pandits look to Kashmir as a holiday destination. Wherever they live, their memories of events in 1989-90 remain vivid as are their rather idyllic recollections of their lives before their flight from the Valley. On this Wikipedia the language links are at the top of the page across from the article title. During the period of Foreign affairs, defence and communications remained the preserve of the central government. Asia, Pacific Amid great power competition, life in the China-Russia borderlands reveals the paradoxes underpinning the Beijing-Moscow friendship. The Kashmiri Pandit community decided to leave. [43][44], The exiled community had hoped to return after the situation improved. Those Pandits in service who felt threatened were free to leave their stations; they would continue to be paid salary. PTI Vivek Agnihotris The Kashmir Files, a movie that delves into the 1990 exodus of lakhs of Further, in the same year, the Rajiv Gandhi-led Congress government at the Centre unlocked the gates of the disputed Babri Masjid-Ram Janmabhoomi temple for Hindu worship. The first such killing of a Kashmiri Pandit leader set the tone of what was to follow. [56][57] They were distributed into the two districts of Valley, the Baramulla district, where Hindus constituted 2.1 percent of the population; 12,919 Hindus out of 612,428 total. [73][74], The Kashmiri Pandits have a tradition of consuming meat, including mutton and fish, but they obey restrictions laid down by the shastras of not eating the meat of forbidden animals such as beef and pork. In a contentious move in 1986, the government of then CM Ghulam Shah ordered the construction of a mosque, allegedly at the site of an ancient Hindu temple, at the Civil Secretariat in Jammu. Those who chose to the first of these were told to leave their women behind. [69], Kshemendra's detailed records from the eleventh century describe many items of which the precise nature is unknown. Newly appointed, he had arrived in Srinagar on January 19. Asia, Asia WebPersian began to be used as the court language in Kashmir during the 14th centuries, under the influence of Islam. Islamist militants began targeting Kashmiri Hindus - upper-caste Pandits - who were a minority group, in the 1990s. [22], Butshikan's heir, the devout Muslim Zain-ul-Abidin (142374), was tolerant of Hindus to the extent of sanctioning a return to Hinduism of those who had been forcibly converted to the Muslim faith, as well as becoming involved in the restoration of temples. Raising the issue later during Zero Hour, BJP member Sunil Kumar Singh demanded that the government start a probe into the "large scale atrocities" committed on Hindus and Sikhs in Kashmir from 1980 to 1990, especially in the period between 1984 to 1989 when Rajiv Gandhi was the prime minister, and culprits be punished. A second, larger wave left in March and April, after more Pandits were killed. The blatant electoral engineering, which disillusioned many Kashmiri youth, became a watershed event in Kashmir's political landscape and catalysed further insurgency. The Chief Minister Farooq Abdullah In agreement with the Central government accepted their demands and freed the jailed terrorists. In Anantnag, the constituency of then Congress leader Mufti Mohammad Sayeed, there was a series of attacks on Hindu temples, and shops and properties of Kashmiri Pandits, blamed on separatist and secessionists. Manish Sisodia Delhi excise policy case: how the right against self-incri What was the UN event representatives of Nithyanandas Kailasa attended? Agnihotri's rendition then suggests that this was among the factors that contributed to the exodus on 19 January, even though the threat was reported to have been published on 14 April, three months after the night of terror. Journalist-lawyer Prem Nath Bhat was shot dead near his house in Anantnag shortly after. A Kashmiri Pandit refugee camp in Jammu. 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