Almost everyone you talk to in the village demands a public hanging. It is a symptom of the deep sorrow and anger that has been building in the sleepy village in South Kashmir’s Kulgam district for over a month now.
In the last week of October, a 21-year-old woman from the village had gone to her aunt’s home in Akhal village, about 8 km away, to attend a wedding. She never returned.
As she stepped out of her aunt’s house on October 31, the woman was abducted, raped and brutalised. She died in a Srinagar hospital nearly a month later.
“I saw her for the first time in the Kulgam district hospital, I can’t even describe her condition to you,” said her brother.
Details of the injuries inflicted on her have shaken the village. It has given rise to a discussion, at least locally, on a subject that has long been taboo in Kashmir – sexual violence against women that has not occurred as part of the political conflict in the region.
The police make arrests
The day she was abducted, the 21-year-old had stepped out to get a wedding dress, her family said. Her attackers would have intercepted her on the way back. The incident allegedly took place barely a kilometre away from her aunt’s house.
“A lot of local residents had gathered near the spot after hearing screams,” said her brother. “They had also caught the accused red-handed and informed police about the incident. Before the family, the police had reached the spot and taken her to the police station Devsar.”
The same day, the Kulgam police said they had received a written complaint alleging abduction and identified two men as the accused – Aadil Ahmad Dar and Waseem Rehman Dar, both residents of Ashmuji village in Kulgam. The police statement claimed they abducted the woman “from Akhal and took her to nearby dense orchards and tried to rape her and also outrage her modesty”.
The accused were arrested “within three hours” of the complaint, it added.
The girl was brought to the police station in an “unconscious and injured condition”, it added. They were booked for abduction, rape and assault, among other charges. After she died on November 27, the Kulgam police carried out a postmortem and added Section 302, murder, to the charges. A police official from the district said they were still investigating the case and a chargesheet was yet to be filed.
Battered and strangled
The woman was taken to the Kulgam hospital first but was so severely injured they could not treat her there. She was transferred to the district hospital in neighbouring Anantnag district and then to the Sher-i-Kashmir Institute for Medical Sciences at Soura in Srinagar. She died there on November 27.
The 21-year-old was the third of four siblings. She was in her final semester at a local college, pursuing an arts degree. “She was the first in our family to complete her studies,” said her brother. “My father had so many hopes and expectations on her.”
About an hour and a half before she died, he said, she had been moved to a general ward. “All these days, she never said anything,” he said. “Twenty two days after she was hospitalised, she had briefly opened her eyes but she could not recognise anyone.”
The family said they had not yet collected her medical records from the hospital. “My sister died a martyr trying to save her honour,” said her brother, his eyes welling up.
Talking sexual violence in Kashmir
The case has shaken Kulgam and also gave rise to scattered protests in Pulwama district, also in South Kashmir. But it was barely reported in the local media.
“Barring Pulwama, there were no protests against this incident,” said a relative. “Why is Kashmir silent over this? If we can protest about the Asiya and Neelofar case, why not over this incident? Why is nobody talking about our daughter? Wasn’t she their daughter as well?”
He was referring to the alleged rape and murder of two girls, known in the public domain as Asiya and Nilofer, in Shopian district in 2009. Their families accused security forces of raping and killing them. Local doctors confirmed sexual assault after initial examinations. The case was later transferred to the Central Bureau of Investigation, which gave a clean chit to the security forces and claimed the two girls had died by drowning. It gave rise to public anger which soon turned into anti-government protests across the Valley.
In the Kashmir Valley, conversations on sexual violence are usually dominated by cases where security forces are accused of such crimes against women, and the alleged impunity enjoyed by the accused, often protected from civil prosecution by the Armed Forces (Special Powers) Act.
The alleged mass rapes at Kunan Poshpora in 1991 are still mourned. Both Kunan Poshpora and the Shopian cases are commemorated in the local media every year. But in cases where the accused are local civilians, a silence usually prevails.
“When one of our own does it, we try and see it as an isolated incident of ‘depravity’ and want to hush up the whole thing because ‘we have an existential threat’ from India,” said author Essar Batool, who has co-authored a book on Kunan Poshpora. “I just read comments [on social media] by many pro-resistance Kashmiris. Criticise the silence on this issue and they just say we have a lot on our plates.”
For Batool, the silence over the Kulgam incident, is a reflection of the dominance of conflict in Kashmiri society. “This is not just today,” she said. “It’s the broader discourse of not wanting to talk about anything else but occupation. So suddenly, a girl’s life is of no value.”
Fear prevails
Meanwhile, shock has given way to fear in the Kulgam village where the 21-year-old student lived. This month, another similar crime was reported at the Devsar police station. A minor had been raped and videos uploaded online. The Kulgam police soon arrested a local resident for the crime.
“Earlier, women would go to attend to their fields alone,” said her sister. “Now, they are afraid. There are sisters who live alone as their husbands are not home at night because of their work, how will they feel safe if an incident like this happens?”
For female students in her family and in the village, the episode has jeopardised their chances of continuing with their education. “Who will want to send his daughter to a school alone after an incident like this?” asked a relative of the 21-year-old woman. “Isn’t it better if she stays home, in front of our eyes?”
Fear, in turn, has given rise to the demand for a public hanging. Meanwhile, the family is gearing up for a long battle in court. “We will fight it till the end but we need the support of everyone,” said the woman’s father, a retired government employee, breaking down. “An incident like this should not happen again, with anyone.”