Lockdown on anniversary of region losing autonomy
SRINAGAR, India — Authorities enforced security restrictions in many parts of Indiancontrolled Kashmir on Wednesday, a year after New Delhi revoked the disputed region’s semiautonomy in a decision that set off anger and economic ruin amid a harsh security clampdown.
Officials lifted a curfew in the restive region’s main city of Srinagar late Tuesday, but said restrictions on public movement, transport and commercial activities would continue because of the coronavirus pandemic.
Government forces placed steel barricades and razor wire across many roads, bridges and intersections. Shops and businesses remained shut and police and soldiers stopped residents at checkpoints.
Several residents said government forces stopped them at checkpoints, saying the curfew was still in place.
“You call it a curfew or virus lockdown, the fact is that we’re under a brutal siege and this siege is a year old now,” said Ishfaq Ahmed, a Srinagar resident.
On Aug. 5, 2019, Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s Hindu nationalist government stripped Jammu and Kashmir’s statehood, scrapped its separate constitution and removed inherited protections on land and jobs.
The region was also split into two federal territories — Ladakh and JammuKashmir. Following the move, Indian authorities enforced an information blackout and a security clampdown in Kashmir for months. Thousands of Kashmiri youths and proindependence leaders, as well as proIndia Kashmiri politicians, were arrested. Hundreds are still incarcerated.
In Ladakh’s Muslimmajority Kargil district, where people have resented India’s move, religious and political groups demanded revocation of the order, calling Aug. 5 a “black day.”