Civilian Deaths Shatter a Lull in Kashmir: Choudhury

The uneasy peace in Jammu and Kashmir, India's northernmost state and its only Muslim-majority one, was broken this month by two separate killings of civilians by security forces. The state, which borders both Pakistan and China, has been a tinderbox since India and Pakistan became independent in 1947. It contains the strife-torn Kashmir Valley, which is administered by India and claimed by Pakistan, and has been the target of repeated incursions by Pakistani militants for over two decades. It also hosts a powerful indigenous movement for independence. The deaths of the civilians were the latest in a long series of human-rights violations in the state and revived memories of the violence last June that erupted after a 17-year-old student was killed by a police tear-gas canister. The event sparked a cycle of protests and reprisals that lasted three months and claimed more than 100 lives.

One of the civilian deaths occurred in police custody, the other was the result of an "encounter" between the police and an alleged militant. They happened even as Indian forces engaged in skirmishes with militants in the district of Kupwara in northern Kashmir. The incidents were indicative of the nightmarish atmosphere that pervades the lives of civilians in the state, where more than 300,000 Indian troops are charged with keeping the peace and flushing out militants. Nazim Rashid, a shopkeeper in his twenties who also went by the name Anjum, was the first casualty. The incident took place on July 30 in Sopore, 35 kilometers (22 miles) from the state capital Srinagar.