\u2018Fear is increasing\u2019
\nIncrease in violence prompts protests and biggest exodus of Kashmiri Pandit families for two decades
\nSrinagar
\nHundreds of minority Hindus have fled from Indian-administered Kashmir, and many more are preparing to leave, after a fresh spate of targeted killings stoked tensions in the disputed Himalayan region.
\nThree Hindus have been killed by militants in Kashmir this week alone, including a teacher and migrant workers, prompting mass protests and the largest exodus of Hindu families from the Muslim-majority region in two decades.
\nSanjay Tickoo, a Kashmiri Pandit activist, said: \u201cSome 3,500 people have left and more will be leaving in coming days.\u201d
\nMany Hindu families said they were waiting to get discharge certificates for their children from schools and then would leave as soon as possible. \u201cFear is increasing with each new killing,\u201d said Tickoo. \u201cThe minorities are facing the worst situation in Kashmir.\u201d
\nOn Thursday morning, suspected rebels killed Vijay Kumar, a bank manager from Rajasthan state, in southern Kulgam district. CCTV footage showed a masked man walking into Kumar\u2019s office and firing a pistol at him.
\nLater in the evening, two Hindu migrant workers were shot at in Budgam by two masked gunmen. One among them, identified as Dilkhush from Bihar, died from his injuries on the way to the hospital.
\nTwo days before that, Rajni Bala, a Hindu school teacher, was killed by suspected militants, also in Kulgam. On 12 May, Rahul Bhat, a Hindu man, was killed when assailants barged into his office and fired bullets at him.
\nAt least 19 civilians have been killed this year in similar targeted attacks in the region, including minority Hindus, government employees and a woman who was known for her Instagram videos.
\nPolice have blamed Pakistan-backed militant groups for the killings. Kashmir has been a disputed territory between India and Pakistan since their independence in 1947. While both countries control the region in parts, they both lay claim over it in its entirety, and since the 1980s, Indian-controlled Kashmir has been rocked by a violent militant insurgency loyal to Pakistan.
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\nAfter the string of attacks, Hindus say they being driven out of the region. These include Kashmiri Hindus, commonly referred to as Pandits, 65,000 of whom first fled from the valley in a mass exodus in the 1990s, when a violent pro-Pakistan insurgency broke out in the region and they began to be targeted.
\nBy 2010, a few thousand Kashmiri Hindus had returned to the Muslim-majority region, enticed by a government rehabilitation policy that provided jobs and guarded accommodation to about 4,000 people. But in recent weeks, those who returned have been protesting against the killings and demanding more security. Hindu employees have been abstaining from their duties, urging the government to relocate them to safer locations.
\n\u201cWe are in a 1990s-like situation,\u201d said Pyarai Lal, 65, who lives in Sheikhpora Budgam, in one of the seven guarded housing facilities provided to Hindus. \u201cMy son is a teacher and he has not attended his duty for the last two weeks. We are afraid to even leave our home. Who knows when a gunman will attack?\u201d
\nLal shifted to southern Jammu city in 1987 with his family and returned in 2010 after the government gave his son a teaching job. But now, he and his family are again preparing to leave. \u201cIt seems the situation is going to get worse and we are going to leave soon to Jammu,\u201d said Lal.
\nAuthorities have promised the employees they will be posted to safer locations, and police made assurances they were increasing security by intensifying counter-insurgency operations, surveillance and using drones.
\nBut many Kashmiri Pandits have accused authorities of barring them from leaving and allege that police and paramilitary forces have been deployed at the gates of their government provided accommodations to stop them.
\n\u201cIt seems the government is waiting to get us all killed,\u201d said Rinku Bhat, a Kashmiri Pandit. \u201cOr they are trying to show false normalcy by forcibly holding us at a place where every minute is unsafe for us.\u201d
\nOn Wednesday, the Kashmiri Pandit Sangharsh Simiti, an organisation that tracks the minority community in the region, wrote a letter to the region\u2019s chief justice raising concern for their safety and accused the government of playing with their lives by preventing them from relocation, seeking high court intervention.
\nThe targeted attacks against Hindus pose a great political challenge to prime minister Narendra Modi\u2019s Hindu nationalist Bharatiya Janata party (BJP) government, which has made repeated promises to look after the interests of Kashmiri Pandits. On Friday, India\u2019s home minister, Amit Shah, held a high-level review meeting on the security situation in the region, but no government statement has been made on the issue.
\nIn 2019, Modi unilaterally revoked Kashmir\u2019s autonomy, and enforced a military crackdown under the guise of greater security for Kashmir. The government introduced a slew of laws allowing non-locals to buy property in the region, in the hope of enticing Hindus to settle in the state, a move many locals feared was Delhi\u2019s attempt to bring about demographic changes in the Muslim-majority region.
\nMany see the removal of Kashmir\u2019s autonomy in 2019, as well as Hindu nationalist policies of the Modi government, which have driven an increase in attacks against Muslims in India, as a driving force behind the growing surge of violence in Kashmir.
\n\u201cKashmiri Muslims feel their religion and identity is in the danger and [the attacks] definitely seems in reaction to that,\u201d said Tickoo.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
\u2018Fear is increasing\u2019 Increase in violence prompts protests and biggest exodus of Kashmiri Pandit families for two decades Srinagar Hundreds of minority Hindus have fled from Indian-administered Kashmir, and many more are preparing to leave, after a fresh spate of targeted killings stoked tensions in the disputed Himalayan region. Three Hindus have been killed by […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":264782,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[8198,83,1373],"class_list":{"0":"post-264751","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-world","8":"tag-hindus","9":"tag-kashmir","10":"tag-killings"},"yoast_head":"\n