Shopian Cover Up.

Excerpts from a report by The Independent Women’s Initiative for Justice

In the afternoon of 29 May, 2009, two young women left home for their orchard. Neelofar and Asiya were sisters-in-law. Neelofar had married Asiya’s brother Shakeel, and had an infant son. Asiya a schoolgoing teenager aspired to become an engineer. In the evening Shakeel learnt that Neelofar and Asiya had not returned home. These are trying times in Kashmir, and there is much cause for concern when people do not return home before dark. Shakeel began his search with friends and family. As night set in, Shakeel sought the help of the police and together they scoured the countryside.

The way to the orchard is crowded with the security forces - the District Police Lines, an army outpost and a CRPF camp, with night lights. The Rambi Ara Nallah that runs through is clearly visible to the lookouts in the CRPF camp, under the glare of the search lights. Before the Justice Jan Commission, the night guards, stated they had seen the search party, but conveniently noticed nothing for the rest of the night, and had no explanation for the mysterious appearance of the bodies.

The police called off the search at 2.30 a.m. promising to restart at the crack of dawn. Around 5.30 a.m. Shakeel resumed the search. An hour later the local police joined and almost immediately the SHO Shafeeq Ahmed pointed out the spot where Neelofar’s body was found. Neelofar’s body was found at a shallow spot which is located about 100 mtrs upstream from Zavora bridge over the Rambi Ara Nallah.

It was observed by Justice Jan in the First Spot Inspection that the depth of the stream around the spot would be 2 -2.5 feet, with reasonably fast flowing water, but certainly not strong current to drown an adult girl. It is pertinent to note that this exact spot had been thoroughly searched by the family and police till 2:30a.m.

Asiya’s body was found further downstream, 1.5 km from the army camp. The exact spot is 1.5 km down stream from Zavora bridge. The dead body was found at an elevated dry spot in the stream. Those who helped retrieve the bodies of the two women saw enough to suspect that this was a case of rape and murder. The photographs taken of the bodies as they were recovered from the Nallah showed visible signs of injuries and wounds. When the bodies reached the hospital, there were two post-mortems performed on them to determine the cause of death and any antecedent injuries. It was put out by the police that the deaths were caused by drowning although the first post mortem report itself had negated drowning as the cause of death of the two women.

Whenever a crime occurs, what leads the investigator to the accused are a series of material, forensic, scientific, medical, circumstantial and ocular evidence. The diligent collection and professional analysis of these pieces of evidence enable the whodunit to be solved. Similarly the mystery surrounding the killing of 2 young women in Shopian could have been unraveled by piecing together the clues.

However at every stage those responsible for unmasking the culprit/s, have systematically and deliberately destroyed, tampered, diluted, the evidence and thus misdirected and obfuscated the investigation. The truth of this damning statement is borne out by the facts enumerated below:

• The spots from where the bodies of Neelofar and Asiya • were recovered were not preserved or cordoned off by SHO Shafeeq Ahmed and SI Gazi Abdul Kareem and no instructions to that effect were given by the S.P. Javed Mattoo. Evidence relating to vehicle tyre marks, footprints was not gathered, these could have provided a vital trail leading to the accused. No instructions were given by the S.P or SHO to photograph the bodies. No detailed or accurate site plan of the spot was prepared. For instance the motorable approach road into the Rambi Ara Nallah is conveniently not marked. Again relevant details such as the depth, width of the stream and the speed of the current were left out.

• Neither the S.P. Javed Mattoo nor the Dy. S.P. went to the spot to supervise the investigation.The S.P.,Dy S.P. and SHO • all three admitted before the Jan Commission that contrary to the settled position of law they did not issue instructions for registration of the F.I.R

• Clothes of the deceased women were not seized nor was any material collected from the spot where the bodies were found. The S.P also admitted that the visible injury of a large size on the head of Asiya was not measured.

The town rose as one to challenge what they saw as an attempt to cover up a crime. Shopian shut down for 48 days. The government had to set up a Commission of Inquiry, an SIT and the High Court had to interest itself in the matter before the town resumed a semblance of the everyday. Majlis-e-Mashawarat, comprising of the elders of Shopian led the demand for justice to the victims, their families and for the assurance of safety to all women of Shopian. The valley joined the call for justice.

6 months later, the CBI reportedly claims that what happened that night was a case of drowning. No one is to blame.

The drowning theory that the CBI is floating does not hold water, for the following reasons:

Neelofar’s body was found in the very place where the police and family had looked for them the last thing the previous night. That is, it was not there at 2.30 a.m., but was found at about 6 o’clock. And no one admitting to having seen it happen despite the high security in the area. Where were the women till then? In hiding? Why? Guard Commander B.B. Kumar and Pradeep Kumar admitted before the Justice Jan Commission that they had instructions to report any suspicious movement in the Nallah during the intervening night of 29-30th May, 2009, but had noticed no suspicious movement of vehicles in the nallah from 2:00a.m. – 4:00a.m. There has been no report or “leak” of the CBI, further questioning these 2 night guards.

• The only test performed on both the bodies was the lung flotation test, performed by Dr. Bilal during the first postmortem on 30th May, 2009, which negated the possibility of death by drowning. When IWIJ met the CB-CID, at their insistence, a post-mortem report was flaunted before us, which did not bear the endorsement that drowning had been conclusively ruled out. Why did the police and Shopian administration announce drowning as the cause of death despite medical evidence to the contrary? Why were senior officers trying to convince us of drowning even after three months through an uncertified post mortem report? The drowning theory however continues to resurface and the CBI leaks are once again trying to resuscitate it.

• All the officers of the department advanced the theory of death by drowning with full knowledge and belief that no one in the recent or past history of Shopian has died due to drowning in River Rambi Ara.

• The Shopian Bar Association had during the course of it’s independent fact finding found 2 public witnesses viz. Abdul Rashid and Ghulam Mohi-ud- Din. On 29th May, 2009 around 7:30 -8:00 p.m., these 2 men just after crossing the Zavora bridge on Rambi Ara Nallah, saw a blue colour 407 police truck with khaki tarpal on the left side of the road, in which 2 girls were shouting ‘Mouji Mouji’. The eight uniformed men guarding the front and rear of the truck abused, threatened and forced these two witnesses to flee from the spot.

• All witnesses who may testify to a cause of death other than drowning have been systematically compromised. Significantly witnesses who did not support the drowning theory have reportedly under sustained interrogation from the CBI changed their stance.

As for accidental drowning, of two women, in such shallows, in a nallah where no one in recent or living memory has ever drowned – we would need to be more than merely credulous to believe that possible! While available evidence has been manipulated and distorted, crucial material, circumstantial,ocular and forensic evidence was deliberately never collected and allowed to be destroyed, lest the tell tale signs point an accusing finger.

Rapes with Impunity

Indian forces and paramilitary militias working with them have been responsible for rape throughout the conflict. Although the cases are created but most of them are never heard, and those which are heard are delayed and apparently denied.Reports of rape from Doda and other border areas have increased since the crackdown in these areas began in 1997.

The case of Sameera illustrates the army's practice of assaulting villagers in punishment because they believe they have supported the militants, or as a means of terrorizing them so that they will not do so. Sameera about fifty, a resident of Ludna, Doda, told Human Rights Watch that on October 5, 1998, the Eighth Rashtriya Rifles came to her house and took her, her husband and her eight-month-old grandson to their base in the village of Charote, some fifteen kilometers away. There they were separated. She said:

They began beating me. They said that we had been feeding the militants. They used electric shocks on my feet. I was raped. They stripped off my clothes and said they would kill me. There were many soldiers and a captain. The captain raped me, keeping everyone else outside. He told me: "You are Muslims, and you will all be treated like this." He was a Hindu, but he told me that he was a Muslim, and that his name was Shahnawaz. He forced me to confess that I had been feeding the militants. This happened on the first night. I was there for fifteen days. Then we were released.

Ten days after their arrest, while the family was still in Charote, Sameera's daughter, daughter-in-law and son were arrested and taken to another army base in Gundna village, where they were held for two days before being released.

When the family returned to their home they discovered that all of their belongings had been taken, including Rs. 10,000 [U.S.$ 250] and jewelry. At the time that Human Rights Watch interviewed Sameera., she had not yet filed a police report but had received medical treatment from a local practitioner. She stated that she was still in pain.

Residents of Marmal, Doda, told Human Rights Watch that in early October 1998 the army cordoned off some twenty villages in the area for fifteen days and during that time took some of the local women to the army camp. Although the women did not talk about what had happened to them, from their behavior the other residents believed that a number of them had been raped.

They are looking for the militants. But they are unable to find any. So they harass the local population .... Our womenfolk are taken into the army camp, all separately. They round up the women, then take two or three in the evening. They come back after two or three days. They are very shy then, and don't want to talk about what has happened to them. The army has pressured them not to speak about what happened.

(Names have been Changed)

The Rape of Loura Jane

She had arrived in Srinagar on October 7th, 1990, from a trip to Ladakh and was lodged in a houseboat on the banks of Dal Lake along with her three friends. Little did she know of the fate that awaited her in Srinagar.


Born in 1966, 24-year old Miss Loura Jane Lambie, a Canadian agricultural science student was on a stroll on October 11th on the boulevard in Srinagar when it was just getting towards darkness. Near the Centaur Hotel, she was having a chat with three local boys asking them about what was going on in Kashmir and was immediately waylaid by personnel of the Indian National Security Guards (MSG) traveling in a white Maruti van. They were armed with automatic weapons and were also carrying a walkie talkie with them. One of them, tall but slim, warned Loura not to get into conversation with local Muslim youths, "All of them are very dangerous terrorists and can also molest you at this desolate spot", he told her.


When the guards asked as to whom she was, she replied, "A Canadian". "You shall have to accompany us to the police station," and thus Loura was asked to board the vehicle. Instead of any police station, Loura was taken to the Oberoi Palace Hotel where the guards had a drink from their own bottles because the bar in the Hotel was closed. She did not drink though she was invited to do so. The guards then ordered her to go back to the houseboat at that late hour, for the Kashmiri militants could kill her at any spot. The guards also took away her purse. Loura was taken to a garden near Chasma Shahi. It was 1am on October 12.


One of the guards directed loura to undress but she did not oblige. Her clothes were then torn and she was laid on the ground and gang raped. She cried under the open sky but there was no one to listen to her moans and shrieks except the sleeping state governor, Girish Saxena, in Raj Bhavan, which is situated only a few hundred yards from the scene of the incident. For a change, Loura was taken to another adjacent garden and the gang rape by five guards of the helpless victim continued. Finally, she fell unconscious.


A semi-conscious Loura was then dropped on the roadside, at a slight distance away from where she had been picked up the previous evening. On being sighted by the locals, she was carried to the police station at Nehru Park where a case for kidnapping and rape was registered under sections 366 and 376 of the Ranbir Penal Code under First Information Report No. 90/40. The police officers at the station recommended a medical examination of the victim and Loura was taken to Lal Ded Women's hospital in Srinagar."All Indian men are scoundrels, I'll not permit you to examine me", - Loura shouted at the male doctor in the hospital. Two female doctors then examined her ascertaining that dead sperms were found in her uterus and in the passage leading to it. There were scratches on her thighs, arms and breasts, which only testify that she resisted.


Loura Jane Lambie told pressmen that very day how brutally "security" guards raped her. The matter when brought to the higher authorities in the state and also when it was taken up with the government of India by the Canadian High Commission in New Dehli, the state police registered a case against the guards, arresting two of them whom Loura had conveniently identified in a batch of sixty-four guards paraded before her. She recognized them despite the fact that both of them had shaved off their beards.Loura was kept in protective custody by the state authorities and was allowed an interview with the state governor on October 13 who promised that stern action would be taken against the guards-turned-rapists.The authorities acted swiftly in view of the Canadian government taking a serious notice of the incident and it was in a record time that an inquiry was conducted and culprits punished.
But they were Left Free after some time.

Here lies the difference between the rape of a foreigner and that of a Muslim Kashmiri woman. The latter is treated as an allegation and passes off unnoticed and unwept.

SOURCE:Weekly Takbeer, Srinagar, October 31st, 1990

"I could hear my sisters' cries from the other room"

On the night of December 30 1994, soldiers from the Rashtriya Rifles unit of the Indian army entered a house in Wurwun village, district Pulwama, seventeen kilometers south of Srinagar, assaulted several family members and sexually assaulted and attempted to rape three women. Rahti Akhtar, forty-five, testified that she first heard dogs barking at 11:30 pm When she looked outside, she saw about eight soldiers enter the courtyard and encircle the house. A few approached the door and knocked. The soldiers asked her to give them some food, and she said that she would send it to the camp. She recognized some of the soldiers as ones she had seen in the area. Fahmeela Akhtar, fifteen, told Human Rights Watch/Asia that at 11:30pm, she was awakened by her mother telling her that the army had come. Her mother then tried to call out to their neighbors, but the soldiers yelled at her to keep quiet.

Then Fahmeela's sister, Mubera Akhtar, seventeen, opened the front door of the house. Three army soldiers entered and stood at the door. One said , "Keep quiet, " then bolted the door from the inside. The soldiers were all in uniforms bearing the Rashtriya Rifles insignia, and they were wearing white boots. All three were drunk. Mubera said to one of the soldiers, "If you want to search, please let us go outside, and you search for what you want." The soldier told her to keep quiet and then at gunpoint forced the men into one room and the five women and three children into another and closed the doors. One soldier remained inside the room with the men. Two soldiers were inside the room with the women.

Nazir, twenty-two, and Mohammad, twenty-four, heard their mother's cries and came downstairs. When the soldiers said that they wanted to search, Nazir asked them if the family could wait outside. He told Human Rights Watch/Asia:

The soldiers refused and forced us at gunpoint into one room. One of them hit me with the butt of his gun. They were carrying Kalashnikov rifles. They smelled of alcohol.One soldier stayed outside the room; the door was not bolted. I could hear my sisters' cries from the other room.

Fahmeela told Human Rights Watch/Asia:

First the soldiers forced Mubera and Amira to the floor and lay on top of them and molested them. One soldier pulled off the top portion of my clothes. I opened the door and tried to run, but the soldier caught me and pulled me back and started to molest me. I was screaming.

Nazir and Mohammad managed to escape from their room. Nazir told Human Rights Watch/Asia:

I climbed out the window and went to the front door, where I saw three soldiers standing. I could not enter the house, but I managed to get into the corridor. Mohammad came into the corridor at the same time. Then the soldiers grabbed us and took us outside. I got hold of a congri and threw it at one of the soldiers and slipped away.

The soldiers had bolted the front doors of the two neighbors' houses, but when the residents went to the second floors of their houses and screamed, other residents of the village came and unbolted the doors and the soldiers ran out of the Akhtar house. The crowd pursued them. As they ran, the soldiers fired their guns in the air. The neighbors followed the soldiers to the entrance of the camp. The soldiers had been in the house for about fifteen minutes.

The next day, when the residents noticed that a soldier’s cap was scorched, they yelled, “He is one of them!" The soldier claimed that he burned his cap while ironing it.

On the following day, December 31, residents of the village gathered to protest the incident, and soldiers from the army camp attempted to disperse them. The next day, the commanding army officer came with some of the soldiers to the village along with a local officer. Rahti told Human Rights Watch/Asia:

The commanding officer told us not to tell anyone what had happened. He said that in exchange, the army would not search houses in the area or conduct a crackdown in the area or arrest any young men. He said, “We are already involved in two cases of this kind. Please don’t involve us in a third case.”

Despite this, the residents lodged a formal complaint with the local police. Afterwards, soldiers from the camp came around warning people not to talk about the incident.

As Human Rights Watch/Asia was conducting these interviews, we observed fifteen to twenty soldiers walking rapidly down the road with three young men from the village in their custody: Nazir Ahmed Dar, twenty-six; Khurshid Ahmed Malik, twenty-six; and Javeed Ahmed Rathore, twenty-four. The three were among the leaders of the gathering in the village the day after the attempted rape. As this report went to print, Human Rights Watch/Asia was unable to determine whether the men were detained for any length of time or released.

Wailing Woes By Aaliya Anjum

Women in Kashmir suffer rape, molestation, kin’s disappearances, psychological trauma and torture, while the much-hyped slogan of Prime Minister Manmohan Singh proclaiming ‘zero tolerance’ towards human rights abuse stares him in the face!

Inspite of the fact that the violations of human rights in Kashmir are in direct disregard of the principles of international human rights and humanitarian law, including the Geneva Conventions and the protocols additional thereto, no attention has been directed to address the issue at national and international levels. An appropriate response is necessitated by the fact that the violations of human rights in Kashmir’s armed conflict have had a direct bearing on its civilian population. Civilian victims, mostly women and children, often outnumber casualties among the combatants. But women suffer in both differing and complex forms. They suffer directly by being subject to rape, molestation and torture and others whose relations are subject to atrocities suffer because of being related to them. It therefore becomes imperative to try and analyse the impact that the past 18 years of conflict have had on Kashmiri women. More so, because there needs to be an awareness and understanding that armed conflict and its impact affect women physically, psychologically, socially and economically. The International Committee of The Red Cross (ICRC) places the impact of armed conflict on women under eight themes: Displacement, security, sexual violence, missing persons, detention, access to medicare, access to food and other assistance and protection under international humanitarian law.

Rape cases
A study done by Medecins Sans Frontieres in mid 2005 reveals that Kashmiri women are among the worst sufferers of sexual violence in the world. It further mentions that since the beginning of the armed struggle in Kashmir in 1989, sexual violence has been routinely perpetrated on Kashmiri women, with 11.6 per cent of respondents saying they were victims of sexual abuse. Interestingly, the figure is much higher than that of Sierra Leone, Sri Lanka and Chechnya. The state home department has no specific data in this regard for the last 17 years. This serves as a telling comment on the plight of women and on the indifferent attitude of the state towards addressing the issue. Cases of rape and molestation abound in Kashmir and many go unreported because of the fear of social stigma, and of reprisal by state agencies. And even in those cases, where the victims manage to transcend these fears and report the matter to police, they achieve little or no justice. More often, police refuses to lodge an FIR against the troops.
In Kunan Poshpora, a small village in Kashmir, the soldiers of fourth Rajputana Rifles allegedly raped about 30 women on the night of February 23, 1991, during a search operation while men were taken away from their homes and interrogated. The ages of women raped ranged from 13 to 80 years. According to newspaper reports, on June 17,1994, troops of Rashtriya Rifles accompanied by two officers Major Ramesh and Major Rajkumar entered into village Hyhama and allegedly raped and molested seven women. In another incident, troops raped a mentally ill old woman in her house in Barbarshah in Srinagar on January 5, 1991. Medical reports confirmed rape and locals lodged an FIR with the concerned police station, but the police did no investigation. She later died in 1998 while the FIR still awaits action from the state government. In another gruesome incident, an army Major in Badra, Handwara, raped Aisha, a 29-year-old woman and her 10-year-old daughter, Shabnum. These being just a few examples, incidents like these are plenty in Kashmir and ironically pass unheeded for.
Due to immunity of troops from prosecution and their own court martial proceedings, which are far from being unbiased, they are left free to do as they please. Dr Maiti, a professor of political science at Rurdwa University, West Bengal, explains, “Rape continues to be a major instrument of Indian oppression against the Kashmiri people while the majority of victims are civilians. This concept stands fortified by a report of ICRC dated March 6, 2001, where it has been mentioned that women are raped in order to humiliate, frighten and defeat the enemy ‘group’ to which they belong. Rape in a war is not merely a matter of chance; it is rather a question of power and control, which is ’structured by male soldiers’ notions of their masculine privilege, by the strength of the military line of command and by class and ethnic inequalities among women. One of the reasons given by Radhika Coomaraswamy for sexual violence in armed conflict is that violence against women may be directed towards the social group of which she is a member because ‘to rape a woman is to humiliate her community’. Complex and combined emotions of hatred, superiority, vengeance for real or imagined wrongs and national pride are engendered and deliberately manipulated in armed conflict. For the men of the community, rape encapsulates the totality of their defeat; they have failed to protect their women. The Special Rapporteur appointed by the United Nations Commission on Human Rights in former Yugoslavia termed rape as not only as an instrument of war but as a method of ethnic cleansing intended to humiliate, shame, degrade and terrify the entire ethnic group.

The Geneva Convention related to The Protection of Civilian Persons In Times Of War, 1949 and Additional Protocols of 1977 provide that women shall especially be protected against humiliating and degrading treatment; rape, enforced prostitution or any form of indecent assault. The Vienna Declaration and Programme Of Action adopted by the World Conference on Human Rights in Situations of Armed Conflict states that violations of human rights of women in situations of armed conflict are violations of the fundamental principles of international human rights and humanitarian law. Even though states are under an obligation to make grave breaches of Geneva Conventions and protocols additional thereto subject to the jurisdiction of their own courts and punishable by severe penalties. The domestic courts do not peruse the law laid down under the said convention for rape trials in conflict areas like Kashmir. However, rape is not explicitly listed as a grave breach of Geneva Convention, although acts wilfully committed and causing great suffering or causing grave injury to body or health do constitute breaches.
The fact that rape has been systematically committed against Kashmiri women and that justice has not been delivered in these cases makes rape in Kashmir eligible for an appropriate legal response at the international level. The state has to be held for breach of its obligations under various relevant treaties and customary international law.
The prosecution of individuals alleged to have committed rape should be done by the international criminal tribunal on the precedent of Nuremberg as the domestic courts and military court-martials have failed to deliver justice in these matters and are motivated by a state centric approach. The focus of the tribunal should be to punish the wrongdoers, not on providing compensation and support to the victim.
The International tribunals are unique in that, they can be established during the continuation of the conflict and therefore they are untainted by the notions of ‘victor’s justice’. Prosecutions must be brought against the alleged perpetrators and those higher up in the chain of command.
Rape is a grave crime as its consequences extend beyond the actual commission, often lasting for the rest of the life of a woman. The social stigma associated with rape renders a raped woman unmarriageable, deprived of respect in the society and traumatised for the rest of her life. In some cases women become unacceptable even to their own families. The necessity to bring the perpetrators of rapes in Kashmir to justice can be understood from the fact that parties to conflict often rape as a tactic of war and terrorism.

Half-widows of the Valley
Enforced disappearances are one of the most harrowing consequences of the armed conflict in Kashmir. During the last 18 years of conflict, the Association of Parents of Disappeared Persons (APDP), an organisation of the relatives of people who have disappeared after custody, claims more than 10,000 people have been subject to enforced disappearance by state agencies and were mostly picked up by the troops. Of the disappeared persons, from 2000-2005 a majority were married males. Although men have been subject to disappearance largely, but women have been adversely affected because of being related to them as daughters, mothers, sisters and wives. In the absence of any information about the whereabouts of the disappeared men, their wives have acquired the title of ‘half-widows’. These half-widows apart from other relatives of disappeared persons are left without any entitlement to land, homes, inheritance, social assistance and pensions. Most of these women also suffer from harassment by the troops.

Fahmeeda Bano, 37, lives in a remote Kashmir village of Kupwara and 14 years back the Indian army picked up her husband. She has gone from pillar to post searching for him but to no avail. She said, “If my husband is alive I want to see him. I want authorities to tell me where he is. If he has been killed let them hand over his body to me…”

The Indian government does not provide any relief to half-widows before the expiry of seven years from the date of disappearance. And even after the completion of seven years from the date of disappearance, they get either a one-time grant ranging from US$1,000 and US$2,000 or a monthly pension of US$10.Further, a half-widow cannot remarry until the expiration of seven years from the date of disappearance of her husband whose whereabouts must not be known in these seven years. In the meantime, the right to her husband’s property are often threatened. Some widows, who intend to remarry, largely do not find men who are willing to marry them. A study titled, ‘Women and Children under the Armed Conflict in Kashmir’ done by Prof A G Madhosh, a Kashmiri educationist and activist, reveals that the migration of widows with their children resulted in a sudden break in normal family life. Women had to assume the roles of breadwinners for their families and the future of their children became insecure.

Every month the members of APDP gather for a sit-in-protest at Central Park in Srinagar. Their continuous protests should have served as a resonating alarm for the authorities, but they seem to have turned a deaf ear to the woes of these people. Fahmeeda Bano, 37, lives in a remote Kashmir village of Kupwara and 14 years back the Indian army picked up her husband. She has gone from pillar to post searching for him but to no avail. She said, “If my husband is alive I want to see him. I want authorities to tell me where he is. If he has been killed let them hand over his body to me.

Psychological Impact
With killings, torture, rapes, molestations, disappearances and detentions becoming the order of the day in Kashmir, psychiatric disorders have seen a sharp increase post-1989. In 1989, about 1,700 patients visited the valley’s lone psychiatric hospital and by the year 2003, the number had gone up to 48,000. Before the onset of the armed struggle, certain disorders that were not known to Kashmiris started showing a significant presence amongst the civilian population. The Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PSTD), one of the psychiatric diseases, which was completely unrecognised before 1990 has witnessed a major upsurge. Major Depressive Disorder (MDO) follows this. There are other mental diseases like bipolar disorder, panic, phobia; general anxiety and sleep disorders that have also shown four-fold increase as told by Dr Arshad of the Psychiatric Diseases Hospital in Srinagar. Substance Use Disorder or drug addiction and suicidal tendencies has been another repercussion of the ongoing conflict in Kashmir. Dr Arshad further added that the patients who come to seek help are largely in the productive age group of 25-30 years’ Mushtaq Marghoob, a leading psychiatrist of the valley states that women bear the brunt of every tragedy. They have to support the family after the death of their husbands, fathers, sons or brothers. Dr Arshad further adds that women form a major part of the patients who are suffering from PSTD (almost 50 per cent). For women whose husbands have died, psychotherapy has failed to produce desired results.
A woman from Batmaloo, Srinagar saw the body of her brother who was killed in custody by soldiers of the Indian army, the body had been split open and his heart had been taken out. The shock rendered her in a state of disturbed bereavement and PSTD ever since. According to Dr Marghoob, women have become increasingly suicidal and are resorting to sleeping pills, injections and inhalations. Even though a large number of people visit the Psychiatric Diseases Hospital in Srinagar, however, this is only a tip of the iceberg as large numbers of patients visit hospitals at the district and sub-district levels.

Nearly every person, particularly women, suffer from general anxiety and the uncertainty pertaining to the security of their family members. These always keep them in a state of unrest and anxiety. Even in their houses people are harassed, beaten up or taken into custody by the troops. The fact that the situation doesn’t seem to get any better, doesn’t promise a better mental state of the civilian population, especially women, in Kashmir.

In past few years, murders, rapes, torture, custodial deaths, and enforced disappearances have witnessed an upsurge, but the response of the state in addressing these atrocities doesn’t promise hope for justice. The official figures of these atrocities are far too less than the reported ones. The factual human rights situation in Kashmir has always been rendered invisible by the national security concerns of the government and the state centric approach of the Indian media. Living in this environment of hopelessness, there are people like Parveena who are still willing to give a tough fight to powers-that-be. Parveena says, “I am determined to fight till my last breath, with or without anyone’s support”. People like Parveena need to be lauded for their determination.

It is being constantly projected in the mainstream media that the situation in Kashmir has improved, but the ever-increasing rate of human rights violations in the valley tell us a different story. People continue to suffer while the much-hyped slogan of Prime Minister Manmohan Singh proclaiming ‘Zero Tolerance’ towards human rights abuse stares him hard in the face!