FILE - In this Aug. 14, 2019, file photo, an Indian paramilitary soldier patrols during a security lockdown after the Indian government stripped the Himalayan state’s semi-autonomous powers in Srinagar, Indian controlled Kashmir. A year after India ended disputed Kashmir's semi-autonomous status and downgraded it to a federally governed territory, authorities have begun issuing residency and land ownership rights to outsiders for the first time in almost a century.
Amid growing fears, experts are likening the new arrangement to the West Bank or Tibet, with settlers — armed or civilian — living in guarded compounds among disenfranchised locals. They say the changes will reduce the region to a colony. About 400,000 people have been given domicile certificates in over a month, Pawan Kotwal, a top Indian official was quoted on Saturday by The Tribune, a north Indian English-daily. Officials have not not said how many of them are locals and have generally been tight-lipped about the process.
“Now our kids have a future. They can be whatever they want to be. We will have choices to make now,” he said. Human rights activists, pro-freedom leaders and Kashmiri residents have long feared that giving outsiders the right to buy land and property could further plunge the region into chaos and set in motion a plan to crush the identity of its people.
Since the early 1950s, Hindu nationalists, including Modi’s Bharatiya Janata Party, have been advocating a solution in India’s favor by neutralizing Kashmir’s Muslim majority inhabitants through settlement of Hindus from other parts of the country.
hussain_aijaz To outsiders?! It is part of India anyone and everyone of Indian citizenship should be able to live in Kashmir like any other Indian states.
hussain_aijaz How is it settler colonialism? Who was there before the Muslims arrived in Kashmir? The Hindus! And what has happened to their number in Kashmir? So why doesn’t the AP cover the genocide of Hindus in Pakistan Occupied Kashmir and India Administered Kashmir?
... what does that even mean
This anti-Indian propaganda driven article fails to mention progress being made by the Indian state in eliminating islamist terror groups operating in Kashmir.
It's Demographic Terrorism .In occupied land
India 🇮🇳 should free Kasmir as an independent country 👏
People of Indian Occupied Kashmir (IOK) are brave, strong and persistent in their freedom struggle. No matter what India does, alone or in collaboration with Israel, they will get freedom, and very soon. IA. OneYearSiege OneYearSiege
India's fascist regime has made Kashmir world's largest prison however champs of human rights are in deep slumber.
I respect but this article is Trash an anti india article , no mention of ethnic cleansing of kashmiri pandits non muslims from kashmir whuch are brutually rapped & murdered by islamic Terrorism in kashmir ..
Anti-India alert! I respect AP, but this article is trash. Both writers are Islamists. “Settler colonialism” is a ridiculous term to describe this, when the reality is that Muslims in Kashmir are the real “settler colonialists.” And no mention of ethnic cleansing of non-Muslims.
Racist communist ap
There are still too many restrictions. Government should remove all restrictions. Muslim residents have chased out most hindus through murder and physical intimidation. Time to equalization the population.
No country should tolerate autonomous zones. Force the issue. Quit allowing segregated cultures that reside within the same country.
so do these outsider press think Kashmir was some other country?
People in Kashmir are not good at crying like those in Hong Kong.
Paid news
If you let Israel do it, you gotta let India do it. It's only fair.
No surprise.
Bit curious, which particular groups will start colonizing the Kashmir Valley, Jammu and Ladakh region? This means that India may be following Pakistan as it already started doing that in the Northern Areas. Mind you, India has already done the same in the Andaman Islands.
Paid news 🤣😭 but pak don't have money except pak girls
FOCUS PMOIndia We just keep trying.
China...