Fear and ‘Safe Zones' in Kashmir

The dramatic and hostile reord­ er ing of Jammu and Kashmir’s political status vis­a­vis the Indian state on August 5, 2019 was followed by a systematic emasculation of the old political order and its replacement by a new set of elected lead­ ers. The BJP­led central government felt that taking control of local governance institutions (panchayat and municipal committees) was the best way to neu­tralise the traditional political parties and its legislators in the absence of a functioning assembly. But nearly two years down the line, grassroots democ­ racy has become a hostage in the battle between the militants and government forces. There have been threats and exe­cutions and instances of elected representatives fleeing their native villages.

- Moazum Mohammad

Rakesh Pandita was elected unopp­osed as a councillor from Tral in south Kashmir in the October 2018 municipal polls. The BJP worker was chairman of the local body, but operated from a base some 40 km from his ancestral village in Srinagar, where he stayed in a makeshift accommodation guarded by two police­ men. Originally a family of beekeepers, the Panditas had fled Kashmir for the plains in Jammu three years after milit­ancy erupted in 1989, but had stayed in touch with their Muslim neighbours. He was visiting a friend, Mushtaq Ahmad, in the neighbourhood on June 2 when three militants barged in and shot him dead. His friend’s daughter was also wounded in the attack.

Rakesh’s uncle Jawahar Lal Pandita, who is based in Jammu, says his nephew had left for Kashmir on May 31 to sign the bills so that employees could draw their salaries. The family had been griev­ ing the death of Rakesh’s father who died on May 16. “Our neighbours in the village would commend his work,” says Jawahar. “Rakesh was overconfident, I kept telling him to keep a low profile. There is no justification for his killing, it helps nobody. They (the militants) could have issued a threat, but the kill­ ing has devastated his family.” The 50­plus councillor leaves behind a wife, a son who is in Class 12, a mother and a mentally challenged brother in Jammu’s Roop Nagar, where vast numbers of Kashmiri Pandit families have settled over the years after fleeing the Valley.