What all happened before the exodus of Kashmiri Pandits - Deep Dive

What all happened before the exodus of Kashmiri Pandits - Deep Dive

What all happened before the exodus of Kashmiri Pandits - Deep Dive





There was an outfit called the Plebiscite Front in Pakistan-occupied areas of Ladakh and Jammu and Kashmir. It was founded by Gilgit-born and Karachi-educated separatist Amanullah Khan in 1965. It had an armed wing called the National Liberation Front. The group was an advocate of holding a plebiscite in Jammu and Kashmir to decide whether people wanted the erstwhile state to merge with India or Pakistan.

The biggest terror act carried out by the National Liberation Front was the hijacking of a Srinagar-Jammu flight in January 1971. They took it to Lahore but ended up releasing all passengers and crew.

Later that year, India and Pakistan fought a war resulting in the Liberation of Bangladesh. The humiliating defeat of Pakistan in the war expedited Pakistan’s proxy war in the Kashmir Valley.

AN AFGHAN TAIL By the end of the 1970s, Islamist fundamentalism was emerging as the dominant theme in Afghanistan, mentored by Pakistani agencies with the aid of the US and Saudi Arabia. Around the same time, the Islamic Revolution under Ayatollah Khomeini took Iran by storm.

The success of Afghan Mujahideen convinced Pakistan of its chances of success in the Kashmir Valley. Funds from Saudi Arabia petro-dollars flowed generously to madrassas that sprang up asserting orthodox Islam over the liberal Islamic tradition of Kashmir.

In Jammu and Kashmir, National Conference leader Sheikh Abdullah was back from the political wilderness after a pact with then Prime Minister Indira Gandhi. Sheikh Abdullah was accused of letting the Wahabi wave take over the Sufism of Kashmir in mosques and among the masses. Hardliner Shia clerics of Iran, too, got a voice in the Valley.

ZIA PLAN IN KASHMIR Against this backdrop, Amanullah Khan founded the Jammu Kashmir Liberation Front (JKLF) as an extension of the Plebiscite Front in Jammu and Kashmir in the mid-late 1970s. But its activities peaked in the 1980s.

In 1984, Amanullah Khan was tasked to trigger an insurgency in the Kashmir Valley by Pakistan Army’s Akhtar Abdul Rehman, who later became its chief.

That insurgency plan was Operation Topac, also called Pakistan’s ‘Kashmir Plan’ or ‘Zia Plan’ after Pakistan’s dictator General Zia-ul Haq. Rehman was General Zia’s close aide and the star of Pakistan’s mujahideen campaign against the Soviets in Afghanistan.

It was a three-stage plan cross-border terror training, execution of bomb blasts and targeted killings, and widespread insurgency to ‘liberate’ Muslim-majority Kashmir.

EVE OF EXODUS By the time Operation Topac was finalised and put to execution by Zia, Rehman and Amanullah Khan, Sheikh Abdullah’s son Farooq Abdullah was in charge of the Jammu and Kashmir government. Islamic fundamentalism that began pervading the Kashmir Valley during Sheikh Abdullah’s final stint had gained enough traction. It was a long-term plan.

In February 1990 the month after the exodus of the Kashmiri Pandits , Amanullah Khan told an interviewer, “Yes, it was [a long-term plan]it had to be well prepared.”

“So, we actually started political planning in 1986 and continued till the end of 1987 for one and a half years we were planning our strategy and it began in July 1988.”

DEATH OF ZIA As per the plan, Operation Topac’s final stage was to be launched in 1991 but the death of Zia-ul Haq in 1988 brought it early. His death in a plane crash gave Pakistan-trained militants to trigger rioting in Srinagar, Baramulla, Pulwama, Bhaderwah and Anantnag.

These urban centres turned into terror hubs. Rioting whipped up passions among the majority Muslim locals. Zia had died but his plan was in execution through a band of terrorists who fanned passions in Kashmir.

‘ISLAM IS IN DANGER’ Farooq Abdullah had become the Jammu and Kashmir chief minister in 1982 after the death of his father Sheikh Abdullah in 1982. His National Conference won the 1983 assembly election but his government fell after his brother-in-law Ghulam Mohammad Shah, aka Gul Shah, split the party allegedly at the instance of the Congress.

His short stint of less than two years is remembered as one of the final stepping stones for Islamic insurgency in Kashmir. In January 1986, Gul Shah announced the construction of a mosque at a place in Jammu Secretariat where an old Hindu temple was located. This led to widespread protests in Jammu and Kashmir.

In February, a Uttar Pradesh court ordered the reopening of Ram Mandir in Ayodhya. Already bracing protests by Kashmiri Hindus, Gul Shah addressed a public meeting in the Valley where he said, “Islam khatre mein hai [Islam is in danger].”

Massive rioting happened in Kashmir Valley . Several temples were attacked. An Associated Press report said army units were moved into the streets “with shoot-on-sight orders in Kashmir to stop an orgy of riots, looting and arson Friday against Hindu targets”.

MUSLIM UNITED FRONT Following communal riots, Governor Jagmohan dismissed the Gul Shah’s government. Little later, Farooq Abdullah signed a pact with then Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi and returned as the chief minister.

This triggered an alliance called the Muslim United Front against ‘Hindu’ Delhi and ‘secular’ Farooq Abdullah. The main force behind the alliance was pro-Pakistan Jamaat-e-Islami. Their leaders demanded the Quranic law be made the law in the state assembly.

Their leaders included Syed Ali Shah Geelani (later Hurriyat chief), Yasin Malik (separatist leader) and Mohammad Yusuf Shah aka Syed Salahuddin (the head of terror group Hizbul Mujahideen).

RIGGED ELECTION Jammu and Kashmir was to hold assembly elections in 1987. The Muslim United Front leaders claimed a wave in the polls but they won only four of over 40 seats they contested. The election is considered as the most-rigged election in India.

The National Conference won the polls but it gave Muslim United Front leaders greater sympathy in the Valley than their actual electoral strength. They boosted Operation Topac forces to unleash terror in the Kashmir Valley.

The election brought Farooq Abdullah to power in Jammu and Kashmir. But Abdullah’s tenure was short-lived as the Rajiv Gandhi government at the Centre lost power to his bête noir, Vishwanath Pratap Singh, in 1989.

Singh made Mufti Mohammad Sayeed his home minister. Sayeed was an arch-rival of Abdullah. He wanted the government gone, and sent Jagmohan as Jammu and Kashmir governor. Abdullah had already declared that he would resign if Jagmohan was made governor. He resigned the same day when Jagmohan was appointed January 19, 1990.

STAGING EXODUS Geared with exclusionist religious passion, generously flowing funds to hardliner mosques and clerics, and support of disgruntled Muslim United Front politicians, Pakistan-trained terrorists launched an exodus plan. Posters were pasted on select homes of Kashmiri Hindus, particularly Pandits. They were asked using mosque loudspeakers to leave their homes or face death by bullet.

The targeted killings that started in September 1989 rose sharply in the Kashmir Valley in January 1990. The exodus of Kashmiri Pandits began soon after as Jagmohan came and Abdullah went away.

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