Human rights abuses in Jammu and Kashmir range from mass killings, enforced disappearances, torture, sexual violence to political repression and suppression of freedom of speech. The Indian Army, Central Reserve Police Force (CRPF), and Border Security Personnel (BSF) have been accused of committing severe human rights abuses against Kashmiri civilians. According to Seema Kazi, militant groups have also been held responsible for similar crimes, but the vast majority of abuses have been perpetrated by the armed forces of the Indian government.
A 2006 report by Human Rights Watch claimed that at least 20,000 civilians had been killed. The Indian government claims 14,000 civilians have died because of the insurgency against Indian rule , with most of these deaths having taken place in the 1990s and early 2000s. Pakistani officials say India has killed more than 100,000 Kashmiri civilians, of which 7,200 died from custodial torture. Moreover, they also claim 162,000 Kashmiris have been tortured.
India and Pakistan accuse each other of violating the ceasefire and targeting civilians at the Line of Control, the de facto border between Indian-administered Kashmir and Pakistan-administered Kashmir. India also accuses alleged state-sponsored militants from Pakistan of committing human rights violations against Kashmiri civilians. Leaked diplomatic cables revealed that the Red Cross had briefed US officials in Delhi in 2005 about the use of torture from 2002 to 2004 by security forces against hundreds of detainees suspected of being connected to or having information about militants.
In a 1993 report, Human Rights Watch stated that Indian security forces "assaulted civilians during search operations, tortured and summarily executed detainees in custody and murdered civilians in reprisal attacks"; according to the report, militants had also targeted civilians, but to a lesser extent than security forces. Rape was regularly used as a means to "punish and humiliate" communities. Scholar Seema Kazi says it is used as a weapon of war by the state against the population.Kazi, Seema. Between democracy and nation: Gender and militarisation in Kashmir. Diss. London School of Economics and Political Science (United Kingdom), 2008. A 2010 US state department report stated that the Indian army in Jammu and Kashmir had carried out extrajudicial killings of civilians and suspected insurgents. The report also described killings and abuse being carried out by insurgents. In 2010, statistics presented to the Indian government's Cabinet Committee on Security showed that for the first time since the 1980s, the number of civilian deaths attributed to the Indian forces was higher than those attributed to insurgents' actions. The Indian Army claims that 97% of the reports about the human rights abuse have been found to be "fake or motivated" based on the investigation performed by the Army. However, a report by the US State Department said, "Indian authorities use Armed Forces Special Powers Act (AFSPA) to avoid holding its security forces responsible for the deaths of civilians in Jammu and Kashmir."
Militant violence in the 1990s, led by the Jammu Kashmir Liberation Front against Kashmiri Hindu Pandits has led to the exodus of several hundred thousands of them out of the Kashmir Valley, who comprised an estimated ~5% of the valley's population before. According to Asia Watch, the militant organisations forced the Hindus residing in the Kashmir valley to flee and become refugees in Delhi and Jammu. The chief perpetrators were the Jammu & Kashmir Liberation Front and the Hizbul Mujahideen. Migration continued until a vast majority of the Kashmiri Pandits were evicted out of the valley after having suffered many acts of violence, including sexual assault on women, arson, torture and extortion of property. Some of the separatist leaders in Kashmir reject this, while others accept it. The Indian government is attempting to reinstate the displaced Pandits in Kashmir. According to the J & K government an amount of ₹71.95 crore was spent in providing relief and other facilities to the Kashmiri migrants living in Jammu and other parts in 2007–08, ₹70.33 crore in 2008-09 and ₹68.59 crore from 2009 up to January 2010. The remnants of Kashmiri Pandits have been living in Jammu, but most of them believe that, until the violence ceases, returning to Kashmir is not an option.
According to a 2022 report by Amnesty International, repression by Indian government has intensified in the region after the abrogation of article 370 in 2019. Amnesty recognized at least 60 instances of human rights violations. The internet was shut down for 18 months after the revocation of special status of the region. The information coming out of the region is totally controlled by the government, with regular internet shut downs and passing policies like 2020 Revised Media Policy and 2021 Film Policy, which restrict press freedom. Indian government shut down Kashmir Press Club which led to further decline in the media coverage and freedom in the region. At least six journalists, human rights activists, and academics were denied travelling abroad despite having all the required documents, restricting freedom of movement without a court warrant or a written explanation.
Indian Armed Forces
Thousands of Kashmiris have been reported to be killed by Indian security forces in custody, extrajudicial executions and enforced disappearances and these human right violations are said to be carried out by Indian security forces under total impunity. Civilians including women and children have been killed in "reprisal" attacks by Indian security forces. International NGOs, as well as the US State Department, have documented human rights abuses including disappearances, torture, and arbitrary executions carried out during India's counter-terrorism operations.
United Nations has expressed serious concerns over large number of killings by Indian security forces.Report of the Special Rapporteur on extrajudicial, summary and arbitrary executions, E/CN.4/1994/7, paragraph 327 Human Rights groups have also accused the Indian security forces of using child soldiers, although the Indian government denies this allegation.The Indian Government claims that even though children can join the armed forces, they are not formally enrolled into regular service before the age of 18. [..]In Jammu and Kashmir, the Indian army has armed local Village Defence Committees (VDC) – primarily Hindus – in Doda, Udhampur and the border districts to assist security forces in anti-insurgency operations.(HRW, Behind the Kashmir Conflict: Abuses by Indian Security Forces and Militant Groups Continue, op. cit.; Bukhari, S., "Militants kill 19 in Jammu", The Hindu, 21 July 1999.) So far more than 15,000 inhabitants, reportedly including teenagers, have joined these self-defence groups.("Jammu & Kashmir: the new vigilantes: despite lack of proper training and sophisticated arms, Village Defence Committees are proving invaluable in the fight against militancy in the state", India Today, 11 October 1999.
At the Asia-Pacific Conference on the Use of Children as Soldiers in May 2000 the representative of the state government of Jammu and Kashmir denied the involvement of children in VDCs. He acknowledged that there may have been some instances of young boys taking up arms to defend themselves under attack, but that there was "no policy to encourage young boys to become members of the Village Defence Committees." Torture, widely used by Indian security sources, whose severity is described as beyond comprehension by Amnesty International, has been responsible for the huge number of deaths in custody.
The Telegraph, citing a WikiLeaks report, quotes the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) that Indian security forces were physically abusing detainees with beatings, electrocutions and sexual interference. These detainees weren't Islamic insurgents or Pakistani-backed insurgents but civilians, in contrast to India's continual allegations of Pakistani involvement. The detainees were "connected to or believed to have information about the insurgents". According to ICRC, 681 of the 1296 detainees whom it interviewed claimed torture. US officials have been quoted reporting "terrorism investigations and court cases tend to rely upon confessions, many of which are obtained under duress if not beatings, threats, or in some cases torture."
Amnesty International accused security forces of exploiting the Armed Forces Special Powers Act (AFSPA) that enables them to "hold prisoners without trial". The group argues that the law, which allows security to detain individuals for as many as two years "without presenting charges, violating prisoners' human rights". The Army sources maintain that "any move to revoke AFSPA in Jammu and Kashmir would be detrimental to the security of the Valley and would provide a boost to the terrorists."
Former Indian Army Chief General V. K. Singh rejected the accusations that the action was not taken in the cases of human rights violations by Army personnel. On 24 October 2010, he has said that 104 Army personnel had been punished in Jammu and Kashmir in this regard, including 39 officers. He also said that 95% of the allegations of human rights abuses against Indian Army were proved to be false, of which he remarked, had apparently been made with the "ulterior motive of maligning the armed forces". Going into details, he said: 'since 1994, 988 allegations against the Army personnel were received in Jammu and Kashmir. Out of these, 965 cases were investigated in which 940 were found to be untrue, accounting for 95.2%, leaving only 25 genuine allegations.' However, according to Human Rights Watch, the military courts in India, in general, were proved to be incompetent to deal with cases of serious human rights abuses and were responsible in covering up evidence and protecting the involved officers. Amnesty International in its report in 2015, titled "Denied"-Failures in Accountability in Jammu and Kashmir, says, "...with respect to investigations, an inquiry that is conducted by the same authority accused of the crime raises serious questions about the independence and impartiality of those proceedings", adding that according to the international law, an independent authority that is not involved in the alleged violations has to investigate such crimes.
In the later revelations on 24 September 2013 made by General V. K. Singh, he said that the state politicians of Jammu and Kashmir are funded by an Army secret service to keep the general public at calm and this activity is there since the partition.
Indian Army