Despite twenty-four years passing since the Chattisinghpora massacre in South Kashmir’s Islamabad district of Indian illegally occupied Jammu and Kashmir, there has been no progress in the case. This delay in justice has resulted in disillusionment among members of the Sikh community.
Thirty-five members of the Sikh community were killed by Indian troops disguised as militants in the Chattisinghpora area of Islamabad district on March 20, 2000, on the eve of the then US President, Bill Clinton’s visit to India, according to a report released by Kashmir Media Service, today.
The report highlights that the Chattisinghpora massacre was orchestrated to tarnish the image of Kashmiris’ freedom struggle and equate it with terrorism. Similar massacres have been perpetrated by Indian troops in plainclothes in the past to malign the Kashmiris’ freedom movement.
It is noteworthy that Indian troops had staged the Chittisinghpora carnage, falsely accusing Kashmiri freedom fighters to vilify their movement. Subsequent investigations revealed that the slain individuals were innocent civilians, with the Indian Army orchestrating a cover-up by staging a fake encounter in the Pathribal area of the district, where six innocent Kashmiris were martyred and falsely labeled as foreign militants responsible for the Sikh massacre.
APHC spokesman Adv Abdul Rasheed Minhas, in a statement in Srinagar, condemned the Chattisinghpora massacre as a sinister conspiracy by India to sow religious division among Kashmiris and defame the legitimate freedom movement. He praised the Kashmiris for thwarting Indian attempts to sow discord through unity.
The APHC demanded international probes into all massacres in Kashmir, including the Chattisinghpora massacre.
APHC-AJK Convener Mahmood Ahmed Saghar, in a statement issued in Islamabad, said that the massacre in Chittisinghpura was a sinister plot by India to divide the Kashmiri people on religious grounds and tarnish the image of Kashmir freedom movement. He stated that the investigations into this heinous mass murder had revealed that the Indian military had orchestrated the killings by falsely presenting six innocent civilians as militants to cover up their own gruesome crime.—KMS
