The world is observing the International Day for the Elimination of Violence against Women, today, while women in Indian illegally occupied Jammu and Kashmir (IIOJK) continue to suffer from Indian state terrorism, injustice, atrocities, fear, agony and the pain inflicted by India. According to a report released by Kashmir Media Service in connection with the day, India has weaponized draconian laws to target the sanctity and dignity of Kashmiri women. Particularly after the illegal actions of the Indian BJP government on August 5, 2019, the Indian army, paramilitary forces, police personnel, and their agencies have used legal cover to openly pursue their agenda by targeting, detaining, and passing derogatory remarks about Kashmiri women while ignoring their social, political, economic, human, and other rights. The report stated that 2,353 women have been martyred, and 11,265 molested and disgraced by Indian troops in the occupied territory since 1989. Indian state terrorism has rendered 22,980 Kashmiri women widowed in the past 36 years.

It added that over three dozen women, including 65-year-old Aasiya Andrabi, Naheeda Nasreen, Fehmeeda Sofi, Aashiya Bano, Aafreena, Nigeena, Ishrat Rasool, Munira Begum, Sarda Begum, Safeeqa Begum, Rubeena Nazir, Nusrat Jan, Shabroza Bano, Mudifa, and Sheema Shafi Waza, have been illegally detained in infamous Tihar Jail and other prisons in India and IIOJK for more than seven years. In 2024, Indian troops arrested several women during house raids based on fabricated cases, including the wife of a nomad, Aqam Din, and Gulshan Naaz, wife of Talib Shah, in Rajouri, Poonch, Samba, and Kathua districts of the territory. The report highlighted that India is using rape as a weapon of war in IIOJK to humiliate Kashmiris. Incidents like the Kunanposhpora mass rape, the Shopian double rape and murder, and the Kathua rape and murder remain glaring examples. Around 100 women were gang-raped by Indian troops during a cordon-and-search operation in Kunanposhpora, Kupwara district, on the night of February 23, 1991.

Two women, Aasiya and Neelofar of Shopian, were abducted, gang-raped, and subsequently killed in custody on May 29, 2009. An 8-year-old Muslim girl, Aasifa Bano, was repeatedly gang-raped by Indian policemen and communal Hindus affiliated with right-wing organizations in the Kathua area of Jammu in January 2018. The report stated that Kashmiri women are mentally tortured through the killing, arrest, and enforced disappearance of their loved ones. It urged global human rights bodies to intervene and stop India from committing heinous crimes and gross human rights violations against Kashmiri women. Meanwhile, All Parties Hurriyat Conference leaders Zamruda Habib, Yasmeen Raja and Farida Bahenji, in separate statements, appealed to the international community to use its influence to halt the ongoing Indian state terrorism, injustice, and atrocities against women in IIOJK.

Credit: Independent News Pakistan