Observer Report
Srinagar
In occupied Kashmir, Indian authorities imposed strict restrictions particularly in Kunan-poshpora area of Kupwara district, today, to prevent people from expressing solidarity with the victims of a mass rape perpetrated by Indian troops twenty on the 29th anniversary of the tragic incident.
Indian troops had gang-raped around 100 women of all ages from eight to eighty years old on the night of February 23 in 1991 during a siege and search operation in Kunan-poshpora.
Inspired by the struggles of the survivors of mass rape and torture in the twin villages of Kunan and Poshpora, the day is observed as Kashmiri Women’s Resistance Day on both sides of the Line of Control every year. Call for the observance of the day as Women’s Resistance Day was, first, given by Jammu and Kashmir Coalition of Civil Society and supported by the All Parties Hurriyat Conference in 2014.
The three decades-long struggle of the survivors from Kunan and Poshpora is a part of the larger on-going struggle in Occupied Jammu and Kashmir, against the institutionalized and structural violence of the Indian state in the territory.
In connection to this day, in her message a seventeen-year-old Kashmiri girl said, “We will stand by our men during freedom movement and will not stop until freedom is achieved.”
Meanwhile, Hurriyat leaders and organizations in their separate statements expressed solidarity with the victims of the heinous mass crime.
The Jammu and Kashmir Muslin Conference Chairman, Shabbir Ahmed Dar in a statement in Srinagar termed the incident of mass rape at Kunan-poshpora as the most horrifying and terrifying in the history of mankind which shook the whole world.
