Qaisar Mansoor
The long-standing conflict in Jammu and Kashmir has resulted in the enforced disappearance of thousands of married men, which has left their wives with a new fractured identity as a ‘half-widow’. Uncertain whether their husbands are dead or alive; their status is in limbo, leading to pervasive economic, social, legal and psychological problems.
The plight of the Kashmiri woman is heart-wrenching. The woman of the Kashmir is being targeted by the occupational forces by design to silent the struggle to the right of self-determination. Women of IIOJK have suffered the most as mothers, wives, widows and sisters but half widows have been the worst case. The Indian security forces often abuse women, particularly half widows, through rape, molestation and other sexual crimes.
The situation of widows and half-widows is an eye-opener for the world if it realizes that more needs to be done rather than mere observing an international day for them. UN Working Group on Enforced or Involuntary Disappearances made a public communique which was sent to Indian government.
They expressed concerns over continued lack of identification and preservation of unmarked single and mass graves in IIOJK, including the failure to conduct forensic investigations in accordance with international standards. Between 1990 and 2009, 2700 unmarked and mass grave sites containing more than 2,940 bodies were documented across 55 villages in the districts of Baramulla, Bandipora and Kupwara located in IIOJK.
Among these, 154 graves contained two bodies each and 23 were mass graves containing more than two (ranging from 3 to 17). Civil society organizations estimate that in the former state of Jammu and Kashmir, 100,000 individuals have been extra judicially killed and 8000 individuals have been subjected to enforced disappearances in so-called staged “encounters” with State forces since 1989. Brutalities in IIOJK reveals a data of over 95,000 killings of Kashmiris, 22,000 plus each widows and orphans, 6,000 mass graves and over 8,000 enforced disappearances.
The life of widows in IIOJK is marked with agony whose husbands have been killed in raising voice for their right to self-determination. The number of half widows as per the Association of parents of the disappeared persons (APDP) is more than 2000.
They still don’t know whether their husbands are being killed or alive. This complex dilemma led to pervasive physical, social, economic and psychological problems because these women cannot re-marry as per Shariah law until it is not ascertained whether her ex-husband is alive or dead.
The intensified military crackdown and the rising numbers of extra-judicial killings in IIOJK are part of the extremist anti-Muslim designs of the “Hindutva” inspired BJP-RSS combine in India. India must realize that use of brutal force against the Kashmiri people, extra-judicial killings, custodial torture & deaths, forced disappearances, incarceration of Kashmiri leadership & youth and other methods of subjugation have failed in the past and will not succeed in the future.
