This is a report of an international people's tribunal convened in February 2010 by the Human Rights Law Network and ANHAD and led by retired judges. The tribunal was organized to provide a platform to the victims of the ongoing armed conflict (for violations suffered since 1990). The tribunal witnessed testimonies from all sections of Kashmiri society, including victims, their family members, social activists, journalists and academicians. In all, 37 testimonies came to be recorded during the two-day long
tribunal. The idea behind conducting such an event was to highlight the sufferings of all such victims and to formulate certain suggestions/ recommendations
in order to minimize the use of force against the common man in the name of national security by the security agencies.
Topics: custodial killings, enforced disappearances, rape cases, Amarnath land row, case of unidentified gunmen, cases of unprovoked firing, expert testimonies, militarization, draconian laws, disappearances, rape, plight of the disabled, failure of all democratic institutions and redressal mechanisms, recommendations, interim report of the tribunal, concluding observations of the UN Human Rights Committee on the Report of India
Terms: extrajudicial killings, custodial rape, judiciary failure, custodial torture, Amarnath land row, Armed Forces (Special Powers) Act, Public Safety Act (PSA), Disturbed Areas Act, lack of accountability, legalized impunity, failure of judiciary, failure of State Human Rights Council, excessive use of force, harassment of human rights defenders, torture, rape as a weapon of war, enforced disappearances, fake encounters, firing on unarmed protestors, psychological trauma, post traumatic stress disorder
Over the last twenty years, the state of Jammu and Kashmir, particularly the Valley of Kashmir, has experienced the worst forms of human rights violations. Torture, custodial killings, rapes, disappearances and fake encounters are on an ever-increasing rise. These practices and the underscoring impunity accorded to the state armed forces, has become a norm rather than an exception. The recent Amarnath Land Row Agitation of 2008, is representative of many other such cases where civilians were taken into illegal custody and tortured, and where unarmed protestors got fired at. What is noteworthy is that survivors of human rights abuse suffer not only physical harm (at times resulting in lifelong disabilities), but are also affected by psychological trauma, as is endorsed by the swelling number of patients suffering from post traumatic stress disorder at the Govt. Psychiatric Diseases Hospital in Srinagar.
Enforced disappearances in Kashmir started in 1989, following the outbreak of armed conflict. The state has seen heavy deployment of security forces (more than 600,000—the highest number of army personnel during peacetime anywhere in the world) since.
On 26th of May 2008, the Government of India and the state government of Jammu and Kashmir reached an agreement to transfer 99 acres (0.40 km2) of forest land to the Shri Amarnath Shrine Board (SASB) in the main Kashmir Valley to set up shelters and facilities for the Hindu pilgrims. This caused a controversy, with demonstrations from the Kashmir Valley against the land transfer and protests from the Jammu region supporting it. After a month of agitation and nearly 100 deaths across the Valley, demands of the Muslim protesters from the Kashmir Valley were accepted by revoking the land transfer decision on 1st of July 2008.
Many injured persons have been disabled for life and have suffered mentally, physically, and financially. Hardly any steps have been taken for their rehabilitation.
February 2010
Originally published
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