A CRIME, RUMOURS & HARD FEELINGS

Economic stagnation, fears of an eroding majority and political instigation have stoked the Kathua gang rape case into a regional flashpoint. Is there a way out? HT finds simmering under the surface, a history of decadesold grievances

Night comes early to the cramped bylanes in the old city of Jammu. The bustling street corners start looking deserted by 9.30 pm and even the ubiquitous monkeys, who trail every weary pilgrim during the day, appear to retire to the shadows. But all that changed last month. Now, groups of men hang around in shop corners trying to catch snatches of the nightly television news shows, immersed in conversation about the latest video they received over WhatsApp or what they had heard in chatter outside the court, or the bus stand, or through a relative in Delhi. Everyone is an expert, everyone has the latest scoop or an incisive analysis or at least, the most impassioned argument. The topic, though, remains the same: The gang rape and murder of an eight-year-old tribal Muslim girl.

The case, which has come to be known colloquially as the Kathua kand, has driven a virtual wedge between Jammu and Kashmir and incensed many dominant Hindu communities, especially the Dogras, who nurse a sense of neglect at the hands of a Muslim-majority state and are particularly stung by what they see is a betrayal by the national press and political parties. But simmering under the surface are decades-old grievances that have been fanned by stagnant economic growth and fast-changing migration patterns.

THE ANGER

Outside the 19th century Raghunath Temple, the second-holiest shrine in the region after Vaishno Devi, groups of young men and women amble about on Thursday, tired from a rally that has just got over. “This is a question of Jammu’s honour,” says one man to loud cheers.

The rally, which snaked its way through the old city, its numbers swelling at every crossing, was led by controversial Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) leader Chowdhury Lal Singh who has become the face of the protests roiling Jammu. He has been demanding a Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) inquiry in the case and has expressed distrust of a state police probe that has named eight Hindu men, including a priest, as the accused. “We will not let Jammu be discriminated against,” thunders the former forest minister. Behind him, a young girl’s voice pierces through the din, mouthing the familiar “Hum Kya Chahte” (What do we want) slogan made popular on the streets of Kashmir. But the roar from the crowd is not azaadi (independence), but “CBI inquiry”.

This demand has become a lightning rod across the Jammu region, from the traditional old town to the newer settlements across the Tawi river, and from the flat valleys and millet fields of the Samba district to the glitzy malls in newer Jammu.

“What’s the problem with a CBI inquiry? Does that make us rape supporters? Jammu has always opened the doors for refugees. But dubbing us as pro-rape, as the media and others have done, is not good. You’re pushing us to the wall,” says KB Jandial, a former IAS officer and Dogra who resides in the city.

The sentiment strikes a chord. Two kilometres outside Rasana village, where the rape allegedly occurred, groups of women and men have been sitting on a dharna on the national highway to Jammu for almost a month. Many of them say they were driven out of their villages because of harassment by state forces. “Many of us lived in fear,” says Santosh Devi, a resident.

All of them back the demand for a CBI probe. “We are not extremists, we don’t support rape. But we will not let them malign Hindus,” says Kant Kumar, a member of the Hindu Ekta Manch, a loose collection of local village chiefs that believes the accused are innocent. Kumar, himself a former Congress leader, is sitting next to Shanti Swarup Sharma, a former block president of the National Conference and a third leader with BJP links, Bhagmal Khajuria. “It seems unlikely that a Dogra can rape in a temple. Even if the charge sheet is true, people won’t believe if the state police say it. CBI is a must,” argues major general (retired) Goverdhan Jamwal. Others echo him – that even if Hindus are guilty, no one will believe that the Srinagar-based government isn’t targeting them.

THE REASON

Bitterness between the two main regions of the state is old but has mounted in Jammu over recent fears of an eroding Hindu majority and an economic downturn reflected in a lack of job opportunities for the youth, who feel resentful at the boom witnessed in other parts of India. Add to this the hurt emanating from a sense of being wronged by India and you have the concoction for a tinderbox.

Author and researcher Javaid Rahi, who belongs to the same Gujjar-Bakerwal tribes as the victim, thinks the main issue

‘AS YOU FIND IN THE ENTIRE COUNTRY, HATE SPEECHES HAVE INCREASED. PEOPLE TRY TO COMMUNALISE ISSUES TO SECURE VOTES. THIS ATMOSPHERE HAS PERCOLATED INTO THE STATE.’

is about land. “A majority of Jammu is proGujjar but there is an increase in the number of Hindu fanatics. Earlier they used to say Kashmiris are settling here and trying to engineer demographic change and now it is against Gujjars.”

Gujjar-Bakerwals, classified as a scheduled tribe in the state, travel through treacherous mountain passes from Kashmir to Jammu every winter and go back as temperatures rise in the plains during the summer. Most of them rear animals, live in straw and mud tents outside villages and are intimately tied to the local communities in Jammu through milk production and shared culture. They say they are illtreated in Kashmir, where Gujjar is often used as an expletive. But the delicate balance might be fraying. Jammu today has a larger population of Muslims, especially around the fringes of the city but this has made many Hindu communities start talking about “Muslims taking over”.

The tensions spilled on to the streets during the 2008 Amarnath land agitation, a terror attack on the Sunjuwan military base in February and en masse settling of Rohingya refugees over the past year. Today, many Rohingyas continue to live in penury in housing next to the highway and mostly work as domestic workers or construction labourers but that has done little to ease perceptions. “We now find people in different dress and cap all the time. They have been given ration cards, included in revenue records. Hindus are disappearing. What was done in Kashmir is now being done here,” says Shailendra Aima of Panun Kashmir, an organisation of Kashmiri Pandits.

The government officially denies all charges and experts say there is a simpler explanation. “Across India, most communities are settling down. And because Jammu is the economic and educational hub of the state, people come here. There is no change in proportional population across the state. But the optics are such that Jammu feels discriminated,” explains Ellora Puri, an assistant professor of political science at Jammu University.

To be sure, the charge of demographic change cuts both ways – as exemplified by the massacre of Jammu Muslims during 1947 that killed half-a-million people. “As a result of these massacres and consequent