New Delhi: A few days after the Pahalgam terror attack on 22 April, 26 -year -old Mohammad Iqbal stepped on Mall Road in Masuri to sell the shawl, as he has done for about a decade. A moment later, a mob surrounded him and another Kashmiri seller, instigated the abuses on them, repeatedly slapped them, and called them “external”.
At midnight the same day, the Musouri police reached the door of Kashmiri vendors and asked them to return home for “time” to ensure their safety, Iqbal told Thrint. Hours later, at least 15 vendors, who traveled more than 700 km to reach Mussoorie for some earning, booked tickets to return to Kashmir. Fearing his life, he left the Uttarakhand hub in the dark of night.
After the April 24 incident, the vendors left the pile of Kashmiri shawls and fare and in a hurry to leave the Musouri at least Rs 20 lakh behind. Whether or not they can return to Moussi to resume their businesses, it remains to be seen.
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This phenomenon is not isolated. Since the Pahalgam terror attack, Kashmiris have been facing violence to work and study on mainland, people asked them to return home for “security”.
To ensure the security of Jammu and Kashmir residents, Jammu and Kashmir Chief Minister Omar Abdullah has deputed his cabinet ministers to various cities of the country. In one, one statement In the official X account of the Chief Minister’s Office, emphasized the unwavering support of the UT government, which he is prominent to the Kashmiris, whether they are now living.
“Currently, with a view to creating a sense of security among our students and traders in other states, I have deputed my cabinet ministers to various cities across the country. ,
Since the video of his harassment in Mussoorie went viral, Iqbal, now back to Dhummullah, Kupwara, is making a call from his family and friends.
“I have been selling shawls in Mussoorie for nine years now. Nothing has happened before. After the Pahalgam terror attack, we were expecting some violence. But why we?” Iqbal asks.
Iqbal says that this incident has worried him about the future of Kashmiri workers across India and Kashmiri women have settled outside the union region. “They are targeting Kashmiris. If we are not safe in India, where should we go?” Asks his family’s only breadwinner Iqbal.
He said, “He checked my ID card, and one of them said that I was not. Then, he defeated me and abused me. When I realized that my life was not valued,” Iqbal, now waiting for the order of the police to return to the city to resume work in a safe environment.
The police have arrested three people in the case.
In Kotwali, Dehradun, a senior sub-ingredient Krishna Kumar Singh told Diprin that soon after the video went viral, the police arrested three harassers, but later released him after issuing challans under the Police Act (1861). After “reprimanded them” by the police, senior SI says, “He apologized for his actions”.
Also read: Pahalgam does not have a hospital, just a PHC. Terrorist attack victims had to go 40 kilometers
Dark day
Javed Ahmed, another shawl seller from Kupwara, was one of the 16 vendors who returned home on 24 April.
Ahmed came to know about the incident when the police knocked on the door of the distressed Kashmiri vendors and asked him to return home with them. The police told the troubled vendors that “the situation was deteriorating because of them”, Javed Ahmed remembers.
According to Ahmed, the two people felt “excessive insult” and decided to restrain themselves by narrating the incident. However, an unknown person shared the video on social media, and soon, everyone was watching and knew. 16 Kashmiri people again came together and left the city.
Javed Ahmed says, “We did not want the video to go viral because we want to return to Mussoorie and start working again.”
Ahmed has worked in Musouri since 2014. He walked on the streets and sold a shawl from a roadside stall on Mall Road. He said, “We had earned 500 to 1,000 rupees per day, based on the crowd of tourists. But, we were grateful,” he said, he said, he said that he learned from his father to work outside Kashmir, who had been selling shawls in Musouri for years.
He said, “People from different parts of India come to Kashmir for daily wages.
Ahmed says that post-Palagam, Kashmiris are trying to take precautionary measures and stay inside their rooms for the next few days, but most of them shout to the families living in poverty. Selling shawls is the only source of their income.
Javed Ahmed says, “Both of these (harassing Kashmiris) did not even have food to eat, which forced them to go out and try and earn some money.” He says that his group came in a man’s video that used to ask others to find and target Kashmiris.
Campaign to provoke fear
The 46 -year -old Kashmiri shawl vendor, Riyaz Habib, was also asked by the police to leave the Musouri and return to “better circumstances”. He said, “He told us that our life is in danger, and it is better to leave and save ourselves.”
With his vending sudden falling, Habib has a huge debt to pay for a shawl that he stocked to sell in Mussoorie. “We were working in Masuri for so long that all the local people knew us. We had good relations with us. But when the incident happened, no one came forward to help us,” he said.
The Habib, whose family of eight depends entirely on their earnings, said that he has not paid for stock shawls closed in his rooms in Moussi, like other vendors. “We have never harmed anyone or anywhere. Whatever happened is unfortunate,” they say.
Nasir Khoomi, the national convenor of the J&K Students Association, said that in the last one week, there have been more than 17 cases of harassment, threats and physical attacks in various states of Northern India. From Mussoorie and Dehradun in Uttarakhand to Himachal Pradesh, Haryana, Punjab, Chandigarh, Jammu, Delhi, Nagpur and Mumbai, “fringe elements have ruled out fear and terror”.
“These are not isolated events; they reflect a distressed pattern that targets Kashmiri students, workers and sellers through stimulating slogans, dangers and ultimatums. Now the atmosphere is charged, filled with worries, and a dangerous pattern of others is uncontrolled,” they say.
Khuhami says that back in 2019, the backlash which came with many physical attacks after the Pulwama attack, but the climate of fear was less “broad”. Today, he says, even the number of events may decrease, “hatred has developed.” It is now “structured, deliberately and digitally amplified.”
“This appears to be part of an orchestrated campaign to create fear in a weak community and suppress them,” he highlights.
(Edited by Madhurita Goswami)