August 5: Darkest day in the history of Indian Illegally Occupied Jammu and Kashmir (IIOJ&K)

PAKISTANIS, along with their Kashmiri brethren, are observing Aug. 5, 2024 as the fifth anniversary of one of the darkest days, also known as Youm-e-Istehsal-e-Kashmir. The dawn of Aug. 5, 2019 brought nothing but continued violation of their basic human rights. On this fateful day, however, in contravention of UNSC Resolution 91 (restraining all parties to the dispute from any unilateral declaration), the Narendra Modi-led government of India decided unilaterally and illegally to revoke the special status, declare the Indian Illegally Occupied Jammu and Kashmir (IIOJ&K) as its integral part, increase its already heavy military presence, impose a curfew on the region and launch a campaign of genocide and displacement with an aim for demographic engineering of the region so as to eliminate those who desired the fundamental right to self-determination as envisioned by the UN charter.

For more than 8 million Kashmiris in IIOJ&K, the annulment of Article 370 and 35A of the Indian Constitution has devastated the ideological outlook by demeaning their demographic reality. This was merely an organized step of the fascist RSS (Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh) to change the Muslim-majority state of IIOJ&K into a minority conclave. The curbs on all freedoms and rights, including those of movement, speech, information, livelihood, and most importantly, dignity and life, have been imposed by a large number of Indian troops (almost one soldier per every eight Kashmiri men, women and children). Myriad cases of mysterious disappearances, extrajudicial executions, incarceration of journalists, lawyers and human rights activists, and deliberate killing of Indigenous people disguised by the officials as the encounters reflected the plight of the millions of Kashmiris forcibly living under the Indian yoke as the Modi regime persisted with flagrant violations of human rights.