India Converted Kashmir Into Concentration Camps

By Sajjad Shaukat

Massacre of the Jews through various tactics of torture in the concentration camps, erected by Hitler before and during the World War II is still shocking and condemnable. It was a large tragedy, popularly known as the Holocaust, conducted by the forces of state terrorism.

According to the Zionist-controlled American leading think-tanks and media, “Genocide of 5 [or six] million Jews was carried out at the extermination camps, using tools of mass murder, such as gas chambers of Germany, Poland, Austria and Alsace”

But, impartial researchers have opined: “All Jews were not killed through gas chambers, but also due to hunger, diseases and depression.”

Renowned historians agree Hitler was an impulsive ruler, guided by ungoverned temper—he was a most ambitious leader who believed in the principle of “world power or downfall.” He had a firm faith in the superiority of the German race and in the inferiority of other races. Anti-Semitism and the Nazi ideology played a major role in Hitler’s thinking. He believed the path to German greatness was through aggressive military actions. He started a programme of enormous armament by developing the German military on modern lines.

After coming to power, Adolf Hitler’s internal policies were authoritarian and totalitarian. The secret police, Gestapo, was formed to deal with the slightest indication of opposition. He mixed politics with religious fervor and massacred several Jews in the concentration camps. 

Hitler and the Nazi Party had come to power with the avowed purpose of conquering colonies and foreign lands for the Germans. They must have a living space, ‘Lebensraum’ as the Nazis called it, for the living surplus German population and find raw materials and markets for German industrial goods.

It was due to Hitler’s unskilled diplomacy that militarization of Germany alarmed France, England and Russia. Thus, they humiliated the Germans, as their country was defeated in the World War II.

Learning no lesson from ‘Hilterite’ Germany, India converted Kashmir into concentration camps. In this respect, Indian extremist Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s government ended special status of the Jummu and Kashmir on August 5, this year by abolishing articles 35A and 370 of the Constitution in a malevolent attempt to turn Muslim majority into minority in the Indian Occupied Kashmir (IOK).

The upper house of India’s parliament also passed a bill proposing the state of Jammu and Kashmir which includes the Kashmir Valley and the Ladakh area—be split into two federal territories. Jammu and Kashmir will have a state legislature, and Ladakh will be ruled directly by New Delhi.

India which already had 500,000 troops in the Indian Controlled Kashmir sent almost 30000 extra troops, while escalating tensions with Pakistan.

Despite, India’s excessive deployment of troops in the Kashmir region, expulsion of Hindu pilgrims, tourists, closure of educational institutions, arrest of the Kashmiri leaders and imposition of curfew, Kashmiris have accelerated the war of liberation, being waged for their right of self-determination, which was also recgonised by the United Nations resolutions.

In fact, India is implementing brutal scheme through military operation to suppress the Kashmiris’ struggle. Indian forces have already intensified state terrorism, as every day innocent Kashmiris are being martyred. In the recent past, Indian forces again used cluster bombs on the Kashmiris. Many Kashmiris have become permanently blind and paralyzed due to pellet guns shots, including chemical weapons used by the ruthless Indian forces.

In this connection, human rights groups and even Western media have condemned Indian illegal measures and human rights violations which continue unabated.

The Independent wrote on August 13, 2019: “Kashmir’s tight security and communications lockdown remained in place…as reports emerged of daily essentials running low. Restrictions on almost all movement in the disputed Himalayan region were strictly enforced…With internet and phone lines still cut off since the decision on 5 August to strip Kashmir of its special constitutional status and the right to make its own laws, the valley has become the setting for all-out information warfare….soldiers stopping vehicles in the centre of Srinagar, causing a traffic jam just as a military surveillance drone flew over….The network of barbed passageways was unprecedented…entire Srinagar city has been knitted in razor wire to seek our silence and obedience…closure of mosques curtailed the religious freedoms of Kashmiri Muslims…Restrictions and curtailment of this fundamental religious freedom of millions of Kashmiri Muslims constitutes a serious violation of applicable international human rights law, to which India is a party.”

The New York Times wrote on August 10, 2019: “On the streets of Srinagar, Kashmir’s biggest city, security officers tied black bandannas over their faces, grabbed their guns and took positions behind checkpoints. People glanced out the windows of their homes, afraid to step outside. Many were cutting back on meals and getting hungry….Shops were shut. A.T.M.s had run dry…internet, mobile phones, even landlines…remained severed, rendering millions of people incommunicado…life under lockdown in Kashmir and found a population that felt besieged, confused, frightened and furious by the seismic event…Several residents said they had been beaten up by security forces for simply trying to buy necessities like milk. Many Kashmiris see India as an oppressive and foreign ruler. Tens of thousands of troops from the Indian Army, the Central Reserve Police Force (a paramilitary unit) and the Kashmiri State police have been deployed in just about every corner of the valley. In some villages, even remote ones, a soldier was posted outside the gate of each family’s home….The lockdown’s effects are visible everywhere. Schools have been closed. Parks are deserted. Baby food is running out…At the Lala Ded hospital, sick people had traveled more than a day to get here, only to find a skeleton crew. Many doctors couldn’t get to work. Many patients were curled up on the floor…Many Kashmiris fear that Mr. Modi’s sweeping decision, which also wiped away a decades-old provision that gave Kashmiris special land ownership rights, will encourage millions of Hindu migrants from India to move into the valley, fabled for its stunning alpine scenery and fertile soil. Kashmiris fear they will be turned into a minority in their own land.”

On August 12, 2019, Human Rights Watch (HRW) demanded the Indian government to lift the communications blackout and step back in Kashmir. In a statement, the HRW South Asia Director Meenakshi Ganguly said since one week Kashmiris remain mostly under lockdown and their leaders are under arrest.

In a press release on August 13, 2019, Amnesty International condemned a decision by India’s Supreme Court to allow New Delhi to continue a security crackdown and communications blackout in Kashmir. Urging New Delhi to ease restrictions imposed in Kashmir, Amnesty warned that “a complete clampdown on civil liberties is only likely to increase tensions, alienate the people and increase the risk of further human rights violations”.

Notably, various forms of state terrorism have been part of a deliberate campaign by the Indian army and paramilitary forces against the Muslim Kashmiris, particularly since 1989. It has been manifested in brutal tactics like crackdowns, curfews, illegal detentions, massacre, targeted killings, sieges, burning the houses, torture, disappearances, rape, breaking the legs, molestation of Muslim women and killing of persons through fake encounters.

Besides Human Rights Watch, in its report on July 2, 2015, the Amnesty International has highlighted extrajudicial killings of the innocent persons at the hands of Indian security forces in the Indian Held Kashmir. The report said, “Tens of thousands of security forces are deployed in Indian-administered Kashmir…the Armed Forces Special Powers Act allows troops to shoot to kill suspected militants or arrest them without a warrant…not a single member of the armed forces has been tried in a civilian court for violating human rights in Kashmir…this lack of accountability has in turn facilitated other serious abuses…India has martyred one 100,000 people. More than 8,000 disappeared (while) in the custody of army and state police.”

It is of particular attention that in 2008, a rights group reported unmarked graves in 55 villages across the northern regions of the IOK. Then researchers and other groups reported finding thousands of mass graves without markers. In this respect, in August, 2011, Indian Jammu and Kashmir State Human Rights Commission officially acknowledged in its report that innocent civilians killed in the two-decade conflict have been buried in unmarked graves.

Foreign sources and human rights organisations have revealed that unnamed graves include those innocent persons, killed by the Indian military and paramilitary troops in the fake encounters, including those who were tortured to death by the RAW. In the recent past, more unmarked graves have been discovered.

In this regard, in its report, China’s leading News Agency Xinhua has unearthed more unnamed graves in Poonch of the Indian Controlled Kashmir. The report quoted the statement of Sofi Aziz Joo, caretaker of a graveyard as saying, “Police and Army used to bring those bodies and direct me to bury them. The bodies were usually bullet-ridden, mutilated, faces disfigured and sometimes without limbs and heads.”

It is noteworthy that in a series of tweets on August 12, this year, Pakistan’s Prime Minister Imran Khan has likened India’s abrogation of Jammu and Kashmir state’s autonomy to Nazi ideology, and warned the international community that inaction would be similar to appeasing Hitler Munich.

Prime Minister Khan further stated: “The ideology of Hindu Supremacy, like the Nazi Aryan Supremacy, will not stop in Kashmir…the Hindu Supremacists version of Hitler’s Lebensraum would lead to the suppression of Muslims in India and eventually lead to targeting of Pakistan…Attempt is to change demography of Kashmir through ethnic cleansing”.

Addressing the session of Azad Jammu and Kashmir Legislative Assembly in Muzaffarabad on August 14, this year, Prime Minister Imran Khan said: “He has assumed responsibility of raising the voice of Kashmir in the world by exposing the true face of RSS ideology dominant in India is dangerous for all…he has tried to fully expose the true face of BJP and its leader Modi before the world in his statements and tweets…ideology of RSS which was inspired from Nazi party of Hitler. RSS followers considered themselves superior to other nations in India. The RSS ideology hates Muslims and Christians for their ruling of India. In their agenda, ethnic cleansing of Muslims is also included…the extremist mindset and ideology of Hindus was responsible for killing of Mahatma Gandhi. This ideology also showed its ugly face in Gujarat carnage of Muslims…the intensity of violence against Muslims in Occupied Kashmir during the last five years is also due to this fanatic ideology”.

The premier also warned that Pakistan will respond with full force, if India launches any aggression against Pakistan, and said, “not only our valiant armed forces, but the whole nation is ready to defend the motherland”.

Taking cognizance of revoking special status of the Jummu and Kashmir by New Delhi, including restrictions on the Kashmiris, Pakistan celebrated its Independence Day on August 14 in showing solidarity with the Kashmiris and observed Indian Independence Day on August 15 as the Black Day in Pakistan.

It is because of joint efforts of Pakistan and China that the United Nations Security Council will hold a session to discuss the situation in Indian occupied Jammu and Kashmir and India’s decision to revoke the special status of occupied Jammu and Kashmir on Friday (August 16, 20119).

Undoubtedly, we can conclude that India converted Kashmir into concentration camps.

Sajjad Shaukat writes on international affairs and is author of the book: US vs Islamic Militants, Invisible Balance of Power: Dangerous Shift in International Relations

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