Omkar Dattatray
It is a great irony that the international community, international agencies and the government of India have not acknowledged that genocide of Kashmiri Hindus had taken place. More than three decades have passed since 1989-90 and the world as well as the Indian government is in no mood to recognize the genocide of Hindus in Kashmir. The bitter truth is that the Kashmiri Hindus had been forced to leave the place of their birth -Kashmir and had also left their movable and immovable properties in Kashmir and they took refuge in Jammu and other hot places of India. The miniscule minority that the Kashmiri Hindus are had been warned and threatened to leave their homes and hearths way back in 1990’s and thereafter under a well planned way by the terrorists abetted and supported by Pakistan. It is very painful experience to abandon ones home and place of birth because, ‘Janani Janam Boomi Swarg Se Mahan Hai’- meaning that birthplace is more pious than heaven. Thus the Kashmiri Hindus had not left Kashmir out of their will but most involuntary they were made to flee Kashmir. The slogans of Challive, Galleve, Rallive which in english means leave, be murdered or be converted and these slogans and warnings as well as the killings of the prominent Kashmiri Pandits scared and terrified the Kashmiri Hindus including Dogri speaking Kashmiri Rajputs and ninety nine percent of them left their homes and hearths. Leaving ones place of birth and home is a very painful experience which they digested very involuntary and with a heavy heart. It is in the fitness of things to know the meaning of term genocide to have a proper idea about the genocide of Hindus in Kashmir. The deliberate killing of a large number of people from a particular nation or ethnic group with the aim of destroying that nation or group. It also implies racial killing, massacre, wholesale slaughter, mass slaughter, wholesale killing, indiscriminate killing and mass murder. Genocide is an internationally recognized crime where acts are committed with the intent to destroy in whole or in part, a national, ethnic, racial, or religious group. These acts fall into five categories. Killing members of the group, causing serious bodily or mental harm to the members of the group. Genocide thus means the deliberate killing of people who belong to a particular racial, political or cultural group. Testing on this touch stone it can be safely said that the genocide of Kashmiri Hindus had happened and there is need to recognize this reality. Now 33 years of their forced exodus have passed and their generations have been made to suffer in their own country and secular democracy. During these more than three decades of their exile they have suffered economically, socially, politically and culturally and the secular rulers looking as mute spectators and this is very unbecoming and disturbing. Kashmiri Pandits were persecuted under the foreign rulers, Phatans and Mughals and it is recorded in Kashmir history that in the past the KPs had been forced to leave the valley eleven times and then only 11 families of KPs were left in Kashmir and so they faced untold sufferings and hardships through their chequred history at the hands of the foreign rulers and it was only under the Dogra rule that they got relief and their sufferings and exploitation was removed to a great extent. Then under the self rule and freedom they faced migration again in 1989-90 and afterwards due to terrorism and terrorism and so these hapless Hindus were persecuted in their own country and democratic rule because they faced penury as the land holdings of the petty land owners which was the main source of their livelihood was snatched from them by the state government under the garb of so called socialism by the congress government headed by Mir Qasim and they were reduced to landless citizens and this had given a big jolt to the Kashmiri Hindus. Then during terrorism,the Kashmiri Hindus faced the worst kind of atrocities at the hands of Islamic terrorists and they had to part with their movable and immovable properties. Hundreds of Kashmiri Pandits were killed and the rest were forced to take refuge outside Kashmir in hot and humid climate to which they were not acclimatized but they beard this and had to face the harsh climate because of forced migration. It is very unfortunate that the successive state governments instead of mitigating their woes added salt to their scars and wounds and they were given the bad name of migrants and thus they are looked down upon. During the long period of more than three decades many of them under compulsion made houses but they cannot be called homes because home lies where heart lies. They faced neglect and apathy of the governments during all these years of forced migration. Hundreds of them died unnatural deaths by sun strokes, snake bites, depression, frustration, tension and because of the ailments of diabetes, high blood pressure and other life style diseases. Culturally they stand devastated as their culture, language, traditions and even the community itself is at the brink of extinction if the steps are not taken to save this community of Kashmiri Pandits. In fact the Kashmiri Hindus face the worst kind of genocide in their own democratic and secular country, but disturbing and ironic is the fact that the genocide of the Kashmiri Hindus is not recognized by the government and the international agencies and they have kept the genocide under carpet and this is the tragedy for the victims of genocide. The massacres of hundreds of Kashmiri Hindus and rape of their women flock and their annihilation is enough to declare their genocide but it has not still been recognized by the international organizations and the government of India. The rape and cutting of the body of one of its women in the band saw and tying of a couple with the running vehicle and other such atrocities should awaken the conscience of the international community and Indian government so that they recognize and declare it as genocide. The Kashmiri Pandit organizations have been demanding and appealing to the international agencies to declare genocide of the Hindus but to their dismay till now they have not been declared as the victims of genocide and this is the tragedy. Unparallel and unprecedented atrocities and worst kind of human right violations had taken place with this hapless community but that those which matter did not declare genocide of the Kashmiri Hindus. However ICHRRF has officially recognized the Kashmiri Hindu genocide. US-based non- profit, international commission for Human Rights and Religious Freedom (ICHRRF) has recognized the 1989-91 atrocities on Kashmiri Hindus as an act of genocide. The ICHRRF has called upon the government of India and the government of UT of Jammu and Kashmir to acknowledge and recognize the 1989-91 atrocities on Kashmiri Hindus as an act of genocide. The commission exhorts other human right organizations, international bodies and governments to step up to the plate and officially acknowledge these atrocities as an act of genocide. The world must listen to these profoundly moving stories, seriously introspect on the impact of their past silence and inaction out of political expediency and make proper recognition of the reality of genocide of Kashmiri Hindus. The ICHRRF said it is profoundly heartbreaking that several Kashmiri Hindu victims of genocide, ethnic cleansing and exile from their homeland, courageously shared their traumatic stories of endurance, survival and recovery from the atrocious human rights violations at the hands of Islamic terrorists that mirrored the Jewish Holocaust. Thousands of homes and temples were destroyed. Over 4,00,000 Kashmiri Hindus men, women and children were forced into exile by the Islamic terrorists at gunpoint, ejected from their homes. Women were gang -raped cut into two pieces with saw and killed in most brutal way. Now their culture is on the brink of extinction. Is not this all enough for declaring the genocide of Kashmiri Hindus? The better sense and sanity should prevail on the international organizations and they should take a call on the matter and acknowledge the genocide of Kashmiri Hindus. It is hoped that in the near future Kashmiri Hindu community will be recognized as the victims of the genocide. In short this will help to balm the wounds of Kashmiri Hindus.
(The author is a columnist, social and KP activist).
